The death of Rodney King

“Can't we all get along?”

• Rodney King

“No Justice! No Peace!"

• L. A. Rioters

“Look at what they're doing to my city!”

• Tom Snyder, host of the television talk show, “The Tomorrow Show,” during the 1992 L.A. Riots.

The 1992 Los Angeles riots following the acquittal of several white L.A. policemen who, in '91, on hidden camera, were caught savagely beating black motorist Rodney King, served as a wake-up call for both black and white America. Black people had been complaining for centuries about police (or other “official”) brutality and racial profiling, to no apparent avail. Whites, for the most part, were not inclined to believe or accept such accusations; or they considered them as highly exaggerated. After all, the police were known to most of them as "Officer Friendly." However, the King beating, the subsequent acquittal, and the fiery almost week-long riot left no doubt that something was truly “rotten in Denmark.”

King was pronounced dead this morning. He was found at the bottom of a swimming pool at his home just outside Los Angeles. Pending an autopsy, no “foul play” is suspected. He was 47 years old.

The Los Angeles Riot of 1992 featured the following:

-- 53 deaths;

-- 2,383 injuries;

-- more than 7,000 fires;

-- serious damage to 3,100 businesses; and

-- nearly $1 billion in financial losses.

Smaller, "sympathy" riots occurred in San Francisco, Las Vegas, and across the country in Atlanta, Georgia.

After the verdict, Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley said, "the jury's verdict will not blind us to what we saw on that videotape. The men who beat Rodney King do not deserve to wear the uniform of the LAPD."

President George H. W. Bush said, "Viewed from outside the trial, it was hard to understand how the verdict could possibly square with the video. Those civil rights leaders with whom I met were stunned. And so was I and so was Barbara and so were my kids." (That would be George W. and Jeb Bush).

Rodney King was an unlikely “civil rights” or “black power” hero. By the time of the beating, he had been in and out of prison for robbery and was, in dact, on parole at the time. Later, one of the reasons he gave for not stopping when the police tried to pull him over was that he was afraid another DUI conviction would violate his parole.

Since the trial and the riot, King has been arrested several times, mainly for DUI and other alcohol-related offenses. He won a $3.8 million civil rights violation settlement against Los Angeles, which apparently only served to further enable his continued "bad behavior."

Clearly, the man was no angel, but he did not deserve to be beaten to within an inch of his life for speeding.

Rest in peace, Rodney King.