He was the greatest symbol of injustice. The person who brought to the national consciousness about how law enforcement can be against minorities in our country. More than anything what happened after the officers did not face justice for their horrific actions they took against this man brought one of the greatest backlashes in the history of the United States. When it was all said and done a city suffered great damage, many lives were lost and a serious scar was placed on the African American community that still plaques us today. Two Sundays ago, the man who came to symbolize this injustice passed away tragically.
On Sunday June 16 Rodney King, the African American motorist whose brutal beating by Caucausian Los Angeles police officers was caught on camera by George Holliday in 1991, which then led to the famed L.A. riots in 1992 when three of the four officers were acquitted died on Sunday.
King’s fiancée, Cynthia Kelley, found his body lifeless at the bottom of the pool at his home in Rialto, CA. Authorities receive a 9-1-1 call shortly after 5 a.m. from King’s home that was placed by Kelley.
“She did try to save him, however she is not a good swimmer and chose to dial 911 and call the police department,” Rialto Police Capt. Randy Deanda said on Sunday.
Officers at the scene began CPR and took King to a hospital where doctors pronounced him dead.
Kelley who met King when she was a juror on his civil case nearly over two decades ago said to friends that he was drinking and smoking marijuana, according to a TMZ report. TMZ also reports that moments before she heard a splash and found King in the deep end of the pool, Kelley said she saw her fiancée was naked, yelling and banging on a glass door.
King was a 25-year-old paroled robber that was Driving Under the Influence [DUI] on Mar. 3, 1991 when he was fleeing from an attempted traffic stop that would have put him back behind bars. He led the California Highway Patrol on an 8-mile chase.
When the chase concluded, four Caucasian Los Angeles Police Officers Tasered him, kicked him and battered him more than 50 times with wooden batons, making no effort to place him in handcuffs.
What brought this to the public’s consciousness’ across the country is that this brutal occurrence was recorded on video by apartment dweller George Holliday, who recorded the entire attack illuminated by a hovering police helicopter.
Holliday sold the tape to a television and the gut wrenching images were played over and over and over again across the country. The four cops were indicted and the case was brought to trial.
“When I saw the tape, I was so happy that it was on tape and then I was looking at it was like me being in another body,” King once said.
On Apr. 29, 1992, case which did not have one single African American juror in Simi Valley, CA acquitted three of the four officers of all the charges. The jury was deadlocked on the fourth officer.
What was to follow was a flood gate of violence that took place throughout South Central L.A.
Within the next 72 hours 3,600 fires were set and 1,100 buildings were destroyed. More than 2,000 people were injured and 55 people died. Arsonists set 7,000 fires that caused nearly $1 billion in damages.
To get a full scope of what was taking place during the L.A. riots of those three days, a Caucasian truck driver named Reginald Denny was pulled from the cab of his rig and nearly beaten to death by four African American men on live television. He never regained his ability to walk or even talk properly.
The violence was so out of this world that in Koreatown where the riots spread to, shopkeepers were armed with guns and engaged people that were looting their stores.
It got to the point where then President George H.W. Bush ordered troops into L.A. to quell the violence.
At the center of this whole ordeal was King, who was still healing from the beating he suffered at the hands of the four LAPD officers. At the height of the violence, King appeared at an impromptu press conference where, according to him he was supposed to read a long script that was given to him by his lawyers at the time.
King looked at it and rejected what was in front of him and decided to say something very simple, but it would be something that would become one of the most iconic pleas that has ever been heard.
King would say, “People, I just want to say, you know, can we all get along?”
The question now is what is the legacy and the lessons of this great American tragedy.
The one thing that this has shown us how an event like this can scar an individual. King who eventually was awarded $1 million for his suffering admitted in an interview two months before his death acknowledge that he spent almost all of it.
Despite having a fiancée, King life was in shambles as he was arrested several times and appeared on reality rehabilitation shows like “Celebrity Rehab” and “Sober House” in order to get his life back on track.
Despite all of that he went through, he still maintained an upbeat attitude. He even said that he saw greater changes in the LAPD from the day the four cops rained more than 50 blows to his body from their batons.
“People looked at civil rights and my situation and said it was time for a change. Now we have a black President,” King said to the Daily News back in April.
While that might be the case, the relationship between the police and minorities across the country is about as strained as ever. Time and time again, we learn of one incident after another about how an African American male comes into contact with the authorities and it results in an incident that could have been avoided. Whether it is NYPD officers taking the life of Shawn Bell back in 2005 or most recently Sanford, FL neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman taking the life of teenager Trayvon Martin and the police do not even report the incident to his family. His body is laying in custody for several days before even being reported.
It is not that hard to believe that on the day of King’s passing that in New York City thousands of people marched on 5th Ave. in silence in protest of the latest form of racial profiling. That being the NYPD’s “Stop and Frisk” policy.
There were barricades placed on 79th street between Madison and 5th Ave. The protestors were not allowed anywhere near the home of NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg (I-NY)
Among those that marched was the fiancée of Shawn Bell, Nicole Bell who came to the march with her father.
“The night my husband was killed, he was pulled over twice. The second time he was killed,” Bell said.
Also at the march last week Benjamin Crump, who is the attorney representing the parents of Trayvon Martin as well as National Action Network President and host of MSNBC’s “Politics Nation” Rev. Al Sharpton and President of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Ben Jealous.
“We are increasing the pressure on the Mayor. Its been far too long. He’s doing ten times more racial profiling than [Rudolph] Guiliani,” Jealous said.
In recent weeks city leaders have sat down with Bloomberg trying to find common ground to deal with the racial problems with “Stop and Frisk.”
“Our problem is the racial profiling part of it and how we can remove that from it so we can fight crime together,” Rev. Sharpton said.
Last week Bloomberg visited the Christian Cultural Centre in Brooklyn, NY as he for the second consecutive week visited a predominately black church to defend “Stop and Frisk.”
Bloomberg says that the program is a big reason that violent crime has dropped for a decade, but acknowledges that the policy does have flaws, but that it needs to be mended and not completely scraped.
“Innocent people who are stopped cannot be treated disrespectfully. That is just not acceptable,” Bloomberg told those at the church last week.
“Commissioner [Ray] Kelly will not tolerate it and neither will I. If you’ve not done something wrong, you deserve nothing but respect and courtesy from the police.”
Bloomberg also says that the NYPD has constituted reforms to try to improve relations between police and the communities they serve.
Within the communities of many minority groups in the United States, especially among African Americans, being profiled is something that is not new. It is something that unfortunately a part of our history. The beating of Rodney King brought it to the attention to rest of America. While some progress has been made, public authorities across the board still look at us unfavorably and it has resulted in a mistrust on both sides and has even resulted in death before some have even had a chance to make names for themselves.
When it comes down to it, this problem will only change when both sides, minorities and public authorities change their prospective and come together and understand that cooperation and showing respect will their be peace.
King, Martin, Bell and those that saw their lives end to soon will only serve its purpose if and only if policies like “Stop and Frisk” are changed for the better and authoritative figures like those in local law enforcement police that commit despicable acts of brutality are held accountable and punished.
Information and quotations are courtesy of Monday, June 18, 2012 article on page 4 of the Daily News; 6/17/12 11 p.m. edition of WABC “Eyewitness News” with Joe Torres and Sandra Bookman, report from Kemberly Richardson; 6/18/12 6 a.m. edition of (WPIX) PIX 11 Morning News with Frances Rivera and Sukanya Kristian, report from Craig Treadway.
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