Published on: Saturday, February 27, 2021

In 1995, 14-year-old Tony Hicks got involved with a gang in Southern California. One night, as he and fellow gang members attempted to rob a pizza delivery driver, Tony shot and killed him. That driver was Tariq Khamisa, a 20-year-old student at San Diego State University (article available here).

Tony became the youngest person in California to be charged as an adult. He served the majority of his sentence in maximum security prisons before he was released in 2019. It was in the prison's visiting room where, a few years into his sentence, he first met Tariq's father, Azim Khamisa.

In a recent StoryCorps conversation from San Diego, he and Azim spoke about healing, forgiveness and the unlikely friendship they formed.