60 YEARS AGO TODAY:
4/1/65 – Rodney King is born …
On March 3rd, 1991, he will be beaten nearly to death by Los Angeles policemen in a case that was broadcast around the world.
When three of the four police officers who took part in the beating were acquitted of the charges the following year (a decision couldn't be reached on the fourth officer), riots broke out in Watts and continued for the next six days, leaving 63 dead and nearly 2400 others injured.
A civil rights case was initiated in 1993, this time finding two of the police officers guilty of using excessive force. (The entire incident was filmed from the balcony of his nearby residence by George Holliday ... and the video was broadcast repeatedly on national news reports thereafter.) King was ultimately awarded $3.8 Million in damages in a separate civil lawsuit in 1994.
King accidentally drowned in 2012.
