Violent crime at Wal-Mart is more pervasive and grotesque than any of the most recent headline-grabbing viruses ever will be.

From Florida to California and everywhere in between, headlines in cities large and small are swollen with frightening accounts of domestic, opportunistic terrorism in Wal-Mart parking lots. Armed robbery, rape, kidnapping, murder and countless other felonious crimes have plagued Wal-Mart’s customers for decades. I have represented some of the most horribly assaulted victims of violent crime one could imagine, and yet it is a case involving a client of mine at a Wal-Mart that left one of the more disturbing impressions upon me.