A Norfolk judge was sentencing Vicktor Stine-Cunningham for his role in a shooting that paralyzed a military mom. He was one of four teenagers who gunned down the woman in front of her two young daughters during a robbery gone bad in Virginia Beach.

As I listened to the victim's family describe their anguish, I could barely control my feelings. I saw her two little girls sitting in the courtroom looking at their mom with adoring eyes, her husband doting on her, constantly worried one of her many medical conditions will cause her to collapse.

And then there's Dawn Weiss... a beautiful example of strength. She's lost the ability to use her legs... legs that once carried her on several 10-mile runs every weeks. She's lost the ability to take care of her daughters, who clearly are the most important thing in the world to her. She's lost all of her physical strength... but clearly, not an ounce of her mental toughness.

She sat there and faced her attackers, one by one, and re-lived the most painful night of her life. She told the story of the shooting and then the incredibly painful and awful aftermath. And she did it with grace, poise, and dignity.

I sat in the courtroom and listened to the Weiss family in awe. I forced myself to blink back tears as I put myself in their shoes and thought about everything they'd lost. I told myself not to cry as I thought about the senselessness of it all.

It's truly a tragic story... but the Weiss family is a great example of the strength of the human spirit.