They started on april 29th 1992 and had a big impact in oj simpson getting off free from his trial in a few years. Rodney king was not related to Martin luther king or jr, he was a black man that had a ho hum life until one night in 1991 when he was beaten after a high speed chase. The beat down was captured on tape(not common in those days) and became a huge media story and cause outrage. The officers however got acquitted without a slap on the wrist causing even more outrage and racial tensions and protests. Meanwhile in florence and Halldale there was a group of people "protesting" in the streets and one person was arrested while a crowd kept getting bigger and bigger and more hostile towards the police. The L.T. ordered all the officers out of the area and that's where the leeve broke, the crowd moved south and other "protesters" decided to loot stores and riot
Meanwhile there was no police presence at all and the lapd didn't respond to calls so that meant there was no police and widespread rioting. What I most remember is the beating of reginald denny, a white truck driver who got pulled out of his 18 wheeler then beaten by some "protesters" just for being white, however he was rescued by 2 black guys who drove him to the hospital so not everyone is evil. There was more looting and setting fires to cars and yes the fire department did respond and get shot at and that is how the next few days went. It lasted days without police so it was anarchy for a brief time. Koreatown was another place that didn't have police presence so many small store owners simply loaded up on guns and protected their business from looters. H. Bush made an announcement that anarchy wouldn't be tolerated and even bill cosby told viewers to watch the last episode of the cosby show instead of rioting. By the 3rd day the national guard was in south central(majority of the looting happened here), the lakers postponed a playoff game and the clippers moved a playoff game to anaheim, the dodgers had games postponed and the hollywood park race track was shut down. There was concerts that were cancelled and even the wwf cancelled some shows among with the mta shutting down some bus and rail lines
By the 4th day the violence was mostly stopped thanks to all the troops and by the 5th day things were under control. The curfew was over on the 6th day but there was still pockets of violence that didn't end until the middle of the month. It left an impact that would be felt in the oj simpson trial and was one of the main reasons why he got free and why so many people cheered when he did even though he was guilty. After the riots it was nice to see a black man beat the law and get off free but as the years go by people have changed their minds and realized a murder got no jail time. There was a gathering after a car chase ended in south central a few years ago but the police responded quickly this time and there was the baltimore riots that were a lot less violent then the rodney king riots
It may have been 25 years ago but the riots are still in the back of the public mind
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