At 12:45 a.m. on March 3, 1991, robbery parolee Rodney G. King stops his car after leading police on a nearly 8-mile pursuit through the streets of Los Angeles, California. The chase began after King, who was intoxicated, was caught speeding on a freeway by a California Highway Patrol cruiser but refused to pull over. Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) cruisers and a police helicopter joined the pursuit, and when King was finally stopped by Hansen Dam Park, several police cars descended on his white Hyundai.
A group of Los Angeles police officers, led by Sergeant Stacey Koon ordered King and the other two occupants of the car to exit the vehicle and lie flat on the ground. King’s two friends complied, but King himself was slower to respond, getting on his hands and knees rather than lying flat. Officers Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind, Ted Briseno, and Roland Solano tried to force King down, but he resisted, and the officers stepped back and shot King twice with an electric stun gun known as a Taser, which fires darts carrying a charge of 50,000 volts.
George Holliday, standing on a balcony in an apartment complex across the street, focused the lens of his new video camera on the commotion unfolding by Hansen Dam Park. In the first few seconds of what would become a very famous 89-second video, King is seen rising after the Taser shots and running in the direction of Officer Powell. Holliday sold his video of the beating to the local television station, KTLA, which broadcast the footage and sold it to the national Cable News Network (CNN). The widely broadcast video caused outrage around the country and triggered a national debate on police brutality.
Rodney King was released without charges, and on March 15 Sergeant Koon and officers Powell, Wind, and Briseno were indicted by a Los Angeles grand jury in connection with the beating. On April 29, 1992, the 12-person jury, which included 10 whites and no African Americans, issued its verdicts: not guilty on all counts, except for one assault charge against Powell that ended in a hung jury. The acquittals touched off rioting and looting in Los Angeles that grew into the most destructive U.S. civil disturbance of the 20th century. In three days of violence, more than 50 people were killed, more than 2,000 were injured, and nearly $1 billion in property was destroyed. On May 1, President George H.W. Bush ordered military troops and riot-trained federal officers to Los Angeles to quell the riot.
The outrage over the Rodney King beating set the stage three years later, for the acquittal of double murderer, O.J. Simpson. Defense Attorney Johnnie Cochrane deftly played the jury, once again charging the LAPD with underhanded tactics.
“Something happens between the weddings and the birthday parties—it’s called the rest of your life.” For Rodney King, the video contained: three officers in particular, as part of a group of 15, kick him seven times, and hit him with nightsticks between 53 and 56 times in less than a minute. “Please stop, please stop.”
The beating stopped for Rodney King on June 17, 2012.
The day was made famous in history 18 years prior when: Arnold Palmer played his final round at the U.S. Open.
The commencement of the FIFA World Cup.
The New York Rangers celebrated their first Stanley Cup Finals win in 54 years with a ticker-tape parade on Broadway.
Ken Griffey, Jr. tied Babe Ruth's record of the most home runs (30) before June 30th.
Game 5 of the NBA Finals between the Houston Rockets and the New York Knicks was interrupted by the slow "white bronco chase" with Al Cowlings at the wheel, and fugitive from justice O.J. Simpson in the back seat.
Rodney King changed America. Reality show skeptics often argue that these TV series must be staged, as much of the content is often pretty outrageous, but the producer says, this is really not the case. There was nothing staged in the "89 seconds" series starring Rodney King. We haven't turned the tv off, since.
Paul Murphy
Follow me on Twitter at @_prmurphy
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