Rodney King dead at age 47

[zboy1]

R.I.P Rodney King




For people who don't remember the beating he took by the LAPD:




Don't forget the beating of Reginald Denny by racist Blacks:




Don't mess with Koreans with guns!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmsKGhLd ... re=related[/youtube]


I was a teen when the LA Riots happened and it shook me to the core: It made me realize just how messed up the country was and woke me up to the abuses by the police towards civilians and the racism that was rampant throughout the United States. Does anyone think things have gotten better or worse since the riots? Personally, I think this have only gotten worse since then and I fear with what the reaction will be if George Zimmerman gets off in the murder of Trayvon Martin.

[zboy1]

LOL

[zboy1]

Can we all get along? Recalling injustice from Rodney King to Vincent Chin

http://blog.sfgate.com/eguillermo/2012/ ... cent-chin/


RODNEY KING

Call it a cosmic coincidence that Rodney King–a victim of the most infamous police beating caught on video tape–died on Sunday. His death comes just a few months after the 20th anniversary of one of the main outcomes of his case–the six-day people’s uprising in Los Angeles, one the worst race riots in U.S. history. King’s death is also just days before the 30th anniversary of the horrific beating death of Asian American Vincent Chin.

That’s a lot of social injustice to recall in one paragraph, let alone one week.

Bad enough that some still ask Vincent Who? Perhaps more distressing is how many people, both young and old, are beginning to ask Rodney Who?

It was before Twitter. Pre-iPhone. Pre-UFC levels of violence. March 3,1991. VHS times. The police were attempting to stop King who had been driving on an LA freeway. A high-speed chase ensued. When he got out of his car, King resisted arrest. The officers used a stun gun and then wailed away with their batons until a bloodied King was left with multiple fractures. Seeing the video again in news reports, I had forgotten the level of brutality used. The video allowed everyone to witness how people of color, but blacks in particular, could be dealt with by law enforcement.

So damning was the video that when the four officers, Sgt. Stacey Koon, Theodore Briseno, Timothy Wind, and Laurence Powell, were acquitted a year later of the state’s charges, the outrage was such that six days of rioting ensued. King would come forward and publicly utter, “Can we all get along?â€￾ But the violence and looting even turned against innocent Asian Americans, when Korean Americans were forced to take arms to defend their stores and businesses.

Koon and Powell were ultimately convicted of federal civil rights charges and served more than two years in prison. King did receive a $3.8 million dollar payout from the city of Los Angeles and its police department. But money isn’t everything, as King found out. Nothing can alleviate the sadness and pain brought on by the revelatory videotape of King’s beating.

Nothing short of a transformation of law enforcement and society.

But can anyone honestly say of the King incident that it could never happen again?


VINCENT CHIN

If only the Vincent Chin beating had the benefit of video, maybe the anniversary date of his brutal killing this week wouldn’t be so sad. At least in King’s case, the video led to two officers imprisoned and a multi-million dollar civil case settlement.

In the Chin matter, no one served any time. Nor was there a penny paid out to Chin’s surviving family.

Those facts always stun any audience that hears a simple re-telling of the case. It never fails to elicit a gasp.

But the Chin case didn’t involve police, just normal citizens.

On June 19, 1982, Ronald Madis Ebens, a then 42-year-old white Chrysler autoworker, along with his stepson accomplice Michael Nitz, then 23, took a baseball bat and bludgeoned Chin, a 27-year-old Chinese American, to death on Woodward Avenue in Highland Park, a suburb of Detroit.

The crisis actually began in the Fancy Pants strip club where Chin was attending his own bachelor party. Ebens and Nitz were there as patrons and commented on Chin and his friends. Ebens reportedly told a stripper, “Don’t pay any attention to those little fuckers, they wouldn’t know a good dancer if they’d seen one.â€￾

Ebens claimed Chin then threw a punch at him. But another witness testified that Ebens got up and said, “It’s because of you little motherfuckers that we’re out of work.â€￾

They saw Chin, a Chinese American, and thought he was Japanese.

Chin and his friends prevailed inside the club and then left. Ebens, bloodied, left with Nitz, retrieved a baseball bat and continued pursuing Chin. They found Chin in a McDonald’s parking lot.

Some witnesses say Nitz held down Chin. Some say he didn’t. Everyone says he was there and did nothing to stop Ebens, who ferociously struck and beat Chin repeatedly, with two savage blows with a baseball bat to the head, leaving Chin unconscious.

For their admitted role in Chin’s death, they served no time.

Ebens is now 72. His accomplice Nitz is 53.

Ebens and Nitz were allowed to plea bargain in a Michigan court to escape mandatory jail time for second degree murder. Ebens pleaded guilty; Nitz pleaded nolo contendere. Both men got this sentence: three years’ probation, a $3,000 fine, and $780 in court costs.

While three-strike felons are doing life in California for non-violent crimes, Ebens, who has admitted to his role in the killing of Chin, is living a life in the sunshine. I actually found him far from the Detroit area. He’s remarried and lives in Nevada.

He’s lucky that he’s generally far less remembered than Vincent Chin himself, because how Ebens got justice–and NOT Chin– only adds salt to the wound.

[MrPeabody]

The police beat him after a high speed chase. I am not in favor of police brutality, but doubt this had anything to do with race. The police were pumped with adrenaline and would probably have beat anyone in that situation. Rodney King didn't seem like a bad guy but not too bright. After making millions of dollars in a court judgment, he ends up dead in the bottom of a swimming pool. Why do we glorify thugs, and not honest people who earned all their money and do better in life despite all the difficulties? The real villain here is the corrupt liberal media that inflamed the situation with race baiting and helped create a riot. How many people remember the names of the more than 50 people killed in the riots? This is the theme of the 60s and post 60s generation - "sympathy for the devil". You guys wonder why women don't want nice guys, but you do the same thing. Nice guys in an evil society are losers and women want to be with the winners. By the way, I was living in central LA at the time near the riots but just stayed in my apartment for a day until it blew over.