The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime that Changed Their Lives (2017)

This section of the book opens with a description of Richard’s activities the day of the incident, which happens a “week or so” (105) after the robbery. Richard gets up, his mother lectures him about his grades, and after school, he leaves with his older cousin Lloyd. Lloyd has a reputation as a troublemaker, but Richard respects him.

In “The 57 Bus” Slater describes Sasha’s usual hour-long commute from school to home and explains that Sasha took the bus because “They love buses” (107). Sasha is obsessed with public transportation, and the 57 bus, despite being “loud, obnoxious” (108) and “charged with daredevil energy” (108), was a place they felt comfortable to spread out and “read, do homework, nap” (108). This particular day, November 4, 2013, they fell asleep.

Next, Slater recounts exactly what happens from the moment Richard and Lloyd board the bus until Richard sets Sasha’s skirt on fire. Slater relies on audio and video recordings from several cameras on the bus that document every minute leading up to the event. Richard and Lloyd see a friend, Jamal. Lloyd is boisterous, shouting and jumping up and down, trying to catch the attention of a girl. Jamal points out Sasha, saying “Look at this dude” (111), then gives Richard a lighter and takes out his phone, pointing it at Sasha. Amidst Lloyd’s antics, Richard tries to put the lighter against Sasha’s skirt. Three times he flicks it, three times it fails to light.

Slater notes that, as Richard came on the bus, he said, “I need a good laugh” (111). All three boys are silly and behaving in a way to get attention and entertain themselves on the crowded, hot bus. Richard later said that lighting Sasha’s skirt on fire was “supposed to be funny” (111), and he smiles at Jamal before the fourth time he tries the lighter. When Sasha’s skirt catches fire, Richard is already off the bus. Lloyd “looked back and stopped, transfixed, as Sasha’s skirt erupted into a sheet of flame” (113).

In the next section of the book, “Fire,” Slater continues the narrative gleaned from the security cameras and describes Sasha screaming, trying to get away from the flames. Jamal, still on the bus, watches Sasha and “howls with laughter” (114); people start to try to escape the bus and the flames, and two men run forward and work together to smother the fire. The bus pulls over, the driver still trying to understand what has happened, and Slater describes Sasha as “roam[ing] the sidewalk with a cell phone, charred legs” (115). One of the men who helped put out the flames tells Sasha to call an ambulance.

As Sasha is on the sidewalk, on “bare, charred legs” (117), Richard first gets on another bus, then back off, to circle Sasha, “staring.” He, Lloyd, and Jamal then run to another bus and leave.

Sasha calls their father, Karl, and says “Dad, I need you to come over here right now. I was on the bus and I got set on fire” (120). Someone has called 911, but it takes nearly 45 minutes for the ambulance to arrive. In the meantime, both Karl and Debbie get to the scene, and the police arrive quickly, but Sasha can’t tell them anything, as Sasha was sleeping. They try to keep Sasha warm without touching the burns, waiting on the sidewalk for the paramedics to arrive. Once they do and have taken Sasha away, Debbie tells bystanders “They did it because he was wearing a skirt!” (122).

Sasha is taken to a hospital with a burn center, and their doctor estimates 22% of their body has been burned, including some third-degree burns, “in which the skin has burned all the way through, down to the fat below” (124). The doctor has, unfortunately, seen worse and knows that Sasha will most likely live. Sasha’s treatment begins with immersion in a tub of diluted bleach.

Richard is arrested at school the next morning and his mother, Jasmine, sees him on television being taken to the police station: “I knew my baby” (132). She does not get to see him for almost a week, and by then, the district attorney has decided not to charge Richard as a juvenile, but as an adult.

Slater recounts the conversation Richard has with the police after they pick him up; before they discuss the crime, they read him his rights. Like over 90% of arrested kids, Richard does not ask for an attorney or a parent. Slater quotes an expert on juvenile justice as saying “[Kids]’re embarrassed, they’re ashamed, they’re thinking in their adolescent brain that somehow their parents won’t find out” (138). Slater also quotes Jasmine as insisting Richard “didn’t understand” what was happening.

During Richard’s interview with the police, he tells them that he is homophobic. They show him the video, and he admits to having set Sasha on fire, but doesn’t know why. He didn’t expect the skirt to catch fire like that.

Slater parallels Richard’s arrest and processing with descriptions of Sasha’s treatment, including a nasal feeding tube and initial surgery. She describes the announcement of Richard’s charges, two felonies with hate crime clauses that could increase his sentence. Since he is being tried as an adult, he may face life in prison.

In “Direct Files,” Slater gives a brief history of how juvenile courts came to be, based on the belief that juveniles were “works in progress, malleable, and could be set on the right path if the law behaved like a stern but loving parent rather than as an instrument of punishment” (162). Then, in the 1980s, this trend reversed, and politicians began talking of juvenile criminals as “super predators” (162), and some states passed laws making it easier or even mandatory to charge juveniles as adults. Slater also presents a series of statistics outlining how this change has impacted young black men disproportionately to the rest of society.

In “The Desk,” Slater interviews district attorney Nancy O’Malley about how society identifies and defines hate crimes. She provides another short history lesson into how hate crimes came to be on the books and the purpose they serve. However, she also notes that “fewer than 5 percent [of those who commit hate crimes] are members of an organized hate group” (170). Rather, most are “groups of young people ‘looking for some fun’ at the expense of someone they regarded as lower status” (170). Slater says this explains why the National Center for Lesbian Rights, the Transgender Law Center, and the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California all wrote to O’Malley to implore her not to charge Richard as an adult.

“Under the Influence of Adolescence” does a deep dive into the physical and psychological development of young adults and how their brains and nervous systems are forming. Slater provides a neurological explanation for how teenagers can make extremely poor decisions in moments of stress and quotes an expert as saying “Even the brightest, best-meaning teenager doesn’t tend to think much beyond the moment, especially when they’re with their friends” (174).

Richard writes two letters to Sasha, both within less than two weeks after the fire. Slater quotes them in their entirety, and they are full of remorse, apology, and contrition. The first is rushed and desperate: “Please forgive me that’s all I want: I take responsibility for all my actions, I’ll take all the consequences” (180). The second is longer, more thoughtful and considered, but still remorseful and penitent: “I don’t have a problem with homosexual’s I have friends that’s homosexuals […] I really don’t know why I did what I did but I hope you don’t think im evil im actually good” (185). The second letter also hints at Richard’s own background: “I’ve also been hurt a lot for no reason” (185) and implores Sasha to meet with him so he can apologize. However, Richard’s attorney does not pass the letters to Sasha or their family because they “contained an admission of guilt” (181).

Slater then quotes from a letter Karl sends to his school community, in which he asks them to “keep in mind that none of us can know the mind, motivations, or intentions of the person who set flame to Sasha’s clothing” (187). She also describes how Jasmine’s gay cousin, Regis, came to court to support Richard.

The people involved with the case continue to debate whether Richard committed or intended to commit a hate crime. Slater explains how his association with Oakland High School is so upsetting to that community that they mount a “No H8” campaign, in part because, as a black person, he also faces marginalization, and his criminal activity plays into harmful stereotypes. The students want to distance themselves from Richard, while in contrast, Sasha receives an outpouring of support from around the world.

Slater turns to Kaprice and Cherie to explain how difficult it is to see Richard pilloried in the press and at school: “I’m not saying what he did was right, I’m just saying at the end of the day, he was sixteen” (197). Kaprice organizes a restorative justice circle to try to give Richard’s friends a place to talk about the incident. Slater last describes a group she calls “The Ladies,” a group of “older white women who dressed as chastely as nuns” (201) and attend all of Richard’s appearances and trial because “it’s a crime to try a child as an adult” (201). Slater quotes Jasmine’s family talking about a recent news story about a group of white kids at San Jose State University who had “relentlessly bullied” an African American student. While none of their actions reached the level of physical violence perpetrated against Sasha, their punishments were extremely lax in comparison to the charges against Richard.

Slater concludes this section with a series of vignettes about Sasha’s injuries, getting out of the hospital, going back to school, and meeting with Dan, one of the people who helped put out the flames. Dan asks Sasha how they feel about Richard, and Sasha says: “I know he hurt me. He did something that’s really dangerous and stupid. But then again, he’s a sixteen-year-old kid and sixteen-year-old kids are kind of dumb” (212).