When word broke yesterday that Marion Barry had been robbed at gunpoint in his Anacostia apartment, we scratched our head and wondered, “What were they thinking? Marion Barry? On his home turf? For only $200?” But fear not, fearless perpetrators, Barry’s not one to hold grudges. Said he in a press conference, as relayed by the Post:

I have no animosities. I don’t even want you prosecuted, really. I love you. Give yourself up. Call the police…I will do all I can to advocate non-prosecution.

While this isn’t nearly as fun as sending out a torch-wielding mob to dig up these hoodlums, we appreciate Barry’s understanding that committing a crime doesn’t necessarily merit punishment. Barry could well have ended the press conference there, on a relatively high note, but he continued:

There is a sort of an unwritten code in Washington, among the underworld and the hustlers and these other guys, that I am their friend.

This is where his aides started thinking of ways to run interference and put a quick end to what was fast becoming a conference gone awry. But Barry saved the day, kind of:

I don’t advocate what they do. I advocate conditions to change what they do. I was a little hurt that this betrayal did happen.

There we have it, folks: Marion Barry, friend of the down-trodden, the underworld, the hustlers. A man with a big heart.