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20 Years Later: Rodney King + His Initial Reaction Following The Verdict

On March 3, 1991, King was the victim of a beating at the hands of four uniformed Los Angeles Police Department officers.

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20 Years Later: Rodney King + His Initial Reaction Following The Verdict
Rodney King (Photo By Justin Hoch)

20 years ago, on March 3, 1991, Rodney King was the victim of a beating at the hands of four Los Angeles Police Officers.

At the end of a high speed chase, an intoxicated King and his two passengers were pulled over on the freeway by the California Highway patrol, joined by several police cars and a helicopter.

The officers alleged that King’s behavior led them to believe he was under the influence of the drug PCP. King later tested negative for the drug.

Due to the police’s initial impression for influence of drugs, they maintained that force was required in order to subdue King and get him to comply with their orders.

King was tasered and struck repeatedly with batons; suffering a fractured facial bone, broken ankle, and numerous other bruises and lacerations.

LAPD officers Stacey Koon, Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind, and Theodore Briseno were charged with use of excessive force. Their April 1992 acquittal led to widespread rioting in the city of Los Angeles, as African Americans felt justice had not been served.

20 years later, King’s name still resonates.

The Rodney King beating bought the issue of police brutality and racial profiling to the forefront.

Unfortunately, there are many victims of police brutality and racial profiling that often go unnoticed and will never receive the attention King’s case has.

At least every Black or person of color will say in their lifetime they have been racially profiled by law enforcement.

Last year, over 600,000 people were stopped and frisked in New York, which a large percentage were Black and Hispanic, and only a small percentage out of the 600,000 were actually arrested.

It wasn’t too long ago that we were talking about Sean Bell, Henry Louis Gates Jr., Amadu Diallo, and Oscar Grant, just to name a few  whose cases shined a light to  the racial disparities and discrimination when it comes to the criminal justice system.

Check out Rodney King’s interview with CNN anchor Don Lemon about his initial reaction following the verdict.

Lemon retraces the events of that morning, and the riots that divided Los Angeles and the nation.

Race and Rage – The Beating of Rodney King, debuts Friday, March 4 at 8:00p.m. ET and PT on CNN/U.S. It replays on Saturday, March 5 at 8:00p.m. ET and PT.


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Unheard Voices is an award-winning news magazine that started in 2004 as a local Black newsletter in the Asbury Park, Neptune, and Long Branch, NJ areas to now broaden into a recognized Black online media outlet. They are the recipient of the NAACP Unsung Hero Award and CV Magazine's Innovator Award for Best Social Justice Communications Company.

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Police

Family of Black girls handcuffed by Colorado police, held at gunpoint reach $1.9 million settlement

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Black girls held gunpoint Aurora
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The family of four Black girls who were wrongfully detained and held at gunpoint by Aurora, CO police have reached a settlement with the city.

Family of Black girls held at gunpoint reach settlement

Finalized on Monday, the families will collectively receive $1.9 million.

The settlement marks the latest payout the City of Aurora has been forced to make over officers’ excessive use of force.

In 2021, the city paid a $15 million settlement to Elijah McClain’s family, a 23-year-old Black man who died in 2019 after officers put him in a chokehold and paramedics injected him with ketamine.

The incident

In August 2020, four Black girls, ages 6, 12, 14 and 17, were held face down on the ground and put in handcuffs in a nail salon parking lot, crying and screaming, as officers towered over them.

Brittney Gilliam, the mother of the 6-year-old, was driving that Sunday morning with her relatives, because they were going to get their nails done together.

Wrongfully detained

But before they made it in the salon, Gilliam was detained after officers mistakenly thought she was driving a stolen S.U.V.

Police had mistakenly believed Gilliam was driving a stolen car.

And a simple second step police failed to take, resulted in the family being wrongfully detained.

Officers didn’t type in the plate number in a second database to show them the make of the vehicle. If they had, authorities said, the officers would have realized that the plate number was registered to a motorcycle in Montana.

Black girls and mother held at gunpoint traumatized

Dozens of bystanders watched the ordeal unfold, and video footage of the incident went viral, sparking protests over racial injustice, citing excessive force on Black Americans.

After the video went viral, Aurora police had apologized for their grave mistake, but the emotional trauma had already happened.

The Aurora Police Department said its officers are trained to draw their weapons before telling passengers to exit the vehicle and ordering them to lie on the ground, The Post reported.

Officers who held Black girls at gunpoint

One of the two officers who drew their guns and handcuffed members of the family was initially suspended.

However, he and the other officer that pulled his firearm remain on the police force, the New York Times reports.

To date, no officers were fired or charged in connection with the incident.


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Police

2023 saw a record year of killings by police in U.S.

The number of people killed by police in the United States reached a new high in 2023, according to new research.

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2023 police killings increase
Photo by Pixabay

The number of people killed by police in the United States reached a new high in 2023, according to new research.

2023 police killings increased dramatically

Mapping Police Violence, a non-profit research group, dockets deaths at the hands of police officers. Last year, it recorded the highest number of killings since its national tracking began in 2013.

Statistics explained

The data reported that police officers killed 1,329 people in 2023, representing nearly a 19-percent increase over the 11-year span.

Nearly 90% of those killed were fatally shot, according to Abdul Nasser Rad, managing director of research and data at Campaign Zero, who runs Mapping Police Violence.

There were only 14 days without a police killing last year and on average, law enforcement officers killed someone every 6.6 hours, according to the report.

Meanwhile last year, the number of people killed by gunfire and officers killed in the line of duty declined, according to data from the Gun Violence Archive. There was an increase in the number of police officers shot.

The newly released data suggests a grim reality and a systemic crisis, with an average of about three people killed by officers each day, with slight increases in recent years. In 2022, 1,250 were killed by police.

The data also reported that Black people were about 2.8 times more likely to be killed by officers than their white counterparts between 2013 and 2023.

Recording police misconduct

For decades, many Americans have suffered various forms of brutality and injustice at the hands of “bad” law enforcement officers.

When a civilian puts in a complaint against the officer only a small percent of complaints result in the officer being disciplined —partly because the accusations are hidden.

Half of the battle is knowing who the “bad” law enforcement are and proper action being taken.

Missin Peace, a national police misconduct database that collects formal civilian complaints against law enforcement, helps fill that void.

In 2022, we had a conversation with the creators, who urged those who filed a complaint against an officer, to upload it on their website as well.

While there is still much work to do, it’s a start.


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14-year-old boy with autism tased by police in what family says was case of mistaken identity

An Illinois family is demanding answers after their 14-year-old autistic son was tased by police in what they maintain was a case of mistaken identity.

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14-year-old autistic tased by police
Photo Source: ABC News video screenshot

An Illinois family is demanding answers after their 14-year-old autistic son was tased by police in what they maintain was a case of mistaken identity.

14-year-old autistic boy tased by police

In an interview with WLS Chicago, the family says that the teen, Avarius Thompson, suffered injuries, including a fractured hip, during an encounter with Dolton police on the morning of Nov.

Police’s incident report

According to the Dolton Police Department’s incident report, Dolton police were assisting police in the nearby neighborhood of Riverdale in the search for four Black males who had fled from a crashed, stolen vehicle, two of whom were allegedly carrying rifles and a handgun.

Dolton officers spotted two subjects, one of whom matched the description of a suspect sought in the incident, in a nearby backyard and pursued them, according to the incident report.

An officer pursuing Avarius ordered the teen to stop before tasing him, according to the incident report.

The incident was captured on the officer’s body-camera footage.

“Hands up! Hands up!” a Dolton police officer can be heard yelling in the body-camera footage as he runs toward Avarius with his Taser extended. After the teen jumps over a fence, the officer deploys the taser, the footage shows.

Avarius attempts to get up when the officer deploys his Taser again a few seconds later, the footage shows.

“Don’t move. Don’t move,” the officer says. “You move, you’re going to get some more.”

Avarius’ father, Eric Thompson, told WLS that the footage was “frightening.”

Read more on ABC News


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