Historical context
One of the most famous cases when people started to notice police brutality was the beating of Rodney King. On March 3, 1991 Rodney King was caught by the Los Angeles police after a high-speed chase. ‘The officers pulled him out of the car and beat him brutally, while amateur cameraman George Holliday caught it all on videotape; and was broadcast to the nation’. The video was a media sensation and it became one of the biggest police brutality cases in history. The four L.A.P.D. officers involved were indicted on charges of assault with a deadly weapon and excessive use of force by a police officer. During the time of Rodney king, the officer’s acquittal in April 1992 triggered riots in South Central, Los Angeles. ‘More than 50 people were killed, more than 2,000 were injured and 9,500 were arrested for rioting, looting and arson, resulting in $1 billion in property damage’ (Bio.com). “Thousands of people throughout the metropolitan area in Los Angeles rioted over six days following the announcement of the verdicts” because they felt like the officers used excessive violence towards Rodney King. The United States Department of Justice filed federal civil rights charges against the four officers and in August of 1992, two of them were found guilty while the other two were acquitted. Rodney king was awarded $3.8 million in a civil trial for the injuries he sustained (Bio.com 2014-05-09 A&E networks television). I think this happen at this time because people were fed up with the police how they were treating people in south central, Los Angeles and wanted justice for what had happened to Rodney king. What it was to be alive at that time you felt like your community didn’t matter if you were Black or Latino thought many minorities to symbolize institutionalized racial intolerance at the time