Los Angeles, California, experienced a series of riots and civil disturbances from April 29 to May 3, 1992. Civil unrest began in South Central Los Angeles on April 29, after a jury acquitted four officers of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) charged with using excessive force in the arrest and beating of Rodney King. The incident, which had been videotaped by George Holliday, who was a bystander to the incident, was heavily reported on by various news and media outlets, such as CNN.
The rioting took place in several areas in the Los Angeles metropolitan area and throughout Orange County, California, as thousands of people rioted over six days following the verdict's announcement. Widespread looting, assault, and arson occurred during the riots, which local police forces had difficulty controlling. The situation in the Los Angeles area was resolved after the California National Guard, United States military, and several federal law enforcement agencies deployed more than 10,000 of their armed responders to assist in ending the violence and unrest.
When the riots ended, 55 people had been killed, 11 of them by the police or National Guard, 2,383 had been injured, more than 12,000 had been arrested, and estimates of property damage were over $1 billion, making it the most destructive period of local unrest in US history. Koreatown, situated just to the north of South Central LA, was disproportionately damaged because of racial tensions between the Black and Korean communities. Much of the blame for the extensive nature of the violence was attributed to LAPD chief of police Daryl Gates, who had already announced his resignation by the time of the riots, for failure to de-escalate the situation and overall mismanagement.
Before the release of the Rodney King videotape, minority community leaders in Los Angeles had repeatedly complained about harassment and use of excessive force against their residents by Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers. Daryl Gates, Chief of the LAPD from 1978 to 1992, has been blamed for the riots. According to one study, "scandalous racist violence... marked the LAPD under Gates' tempestuous leadership." Under Gates, the LAPD had begun Operation Hammer in April 1987, which was a large-scale militarized push in Los Angeles.
The city, like other large metropolitan areas in United States, was also largely affected by a wave of crime due to the crack epidemic in the United States, the Crips–Bloods gang war and an intensification of the war on drugs.
The origin of Operation Hammer can be traced to the 1984 Olympic Games held in Los Angeles. Under Gates' direction, the LAPD expanded gang sweeps for the duration of the Olympics. These were implemented across wide areas of the city but especially in South Central and East Los Angeles, areas of predominantly minority residents. After the games were over, the city began to revive the use of earlier anti-trade union and anti-syndicalist laws in order to maintain the security policy started for the Olympic games. The police more frequently conducted mass arrests of African American youth. Citizen complaints against police brutality increased 33 percent in the period 1984–1989.
By 1990 over 50,000 people, mostly minority males, had been arrested in such raids. Critics have stated that the operation was racially motivated because it used racial profiling, targeting African American and Mexican American youths. The perception that police had targeted non-white citizens likely contributed to the anger that erupted in the 1992 riots.
The Christopher Commission later concluded that a "significant number" of LAPD officers "repetitively use excessive force against the public and persistently ignore the written guidelines of the department regarding force". The biases related to race, gender, and sexual orientation were found to have regularly contributed to the LAPD's use of excessive force. The commission's report called for the replacement of both Chief Daryl Gates and the civilian Police Commission.
In the years before the riots, resentment and violence between the African American and Korean American communities in Los Angeles were increasing. Many Korean shopkeepers were upset because they suspected shoplifting from their black customers and neighbors. Many black customers were angry because they routinely felt disrespected and humiliated by Korean store owners. Neither group fully understood the extent of the cultural differences and language barriers, which further fueled tensions.
On March 16, 1991, a year before the Los Angeles riots, storekeeper Soon Ja Du shot and killed Black ninth-grader Latasha Harlins after a physical altercation. Du was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and the jury recommended the maximum sentence of 16 years, but the judge, Joyce Karlin, decided against prison time and sentenced Du to five years of probation, 400 hours of community service, and a $500 fine instead. Relations between the African American and Korean communities significantly worsened after this, and the former became increasingly mistrustful of the criminal justice system.
Tensions between African Americans and Korean American store owners in South Central Los Angeles were already signaled in the 1991 Ice Cube song "Black Korea." The Los Angeles Times reported on several other significant incidents of violence between the communities at the time:
Other recent incidents involve the tragic events of May 25, 1991, where two employees at a liquor store near 35th Street and Central Avenue were shot. Both victims, who had recently immigrated from Korea, lost their lives after complying with the demands of a robber described by the police as an African American. Additionally, last Thursday, an African American man suspected of committing a robbery in an auto parts store on Manchester Avenue was fatally injured by his accomplice. The incident occurred when his accomplice accidentally discharged a shotgun round during a struggle with the Korean American owner of the shop. "This violence is deeply unsettling," stated store owner Park. "But sadly, who speaks up for these victims?"
Legal scholar Alice H. Choi saw four "prominent factors" that led to the riots: "(a) racism; (b) tension among ethnic minorities; (c) economic strife in the African American community juxtaposed against the apparent success of Korean
Americans doing business in the community; and, (d) exploitation of all of the above by the media." She sees the interaction between Du and Harlins as an example of how different cultural systems can clash: "It is possible that Du, being the older woman, expected courtesy from Harlins, a teenager, and Harlins, as a customer, expected the same courtesy from Du, a merchant."
On the evening of March 3, 1991, Rodney King and two passengers were driving west on the Foothill Freeway (I-210) through the Sunland-Tujunga neighborhood of the San Fernando Valley. The California Highway Patrol (CHP) attempted to initiate a traffic stop and a high-speed pursuit ensued with speeds estimated at up to 115 mph (185 km/h), before King eventually exited the freeway at Foothill Boulevard. The pursuit continued through residential neighborhoods of Lake View Terrace in San Fernando Valley before King stopped in front of the Hansen Dam recreation center. When King finally stopped, LAPD and CHP officers surrounded King's vehicle and married CHP officers Timothy and Melanie Singer arrested him and the other occupants.
After the two passengers were placed in the patrol car, five Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers – Stacey Koon, Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind, Theodore Briseno, and Rolando Solano – surrounded King, who came out of the car last. None of the officers involved were African-American; officers Koon, Wind and Powell were white, while Briseno and Solano were of Hispanic origin. They tasered King, struck him dozens of times with side-handled batons, kick-stomped him in his back and tackled him to the ground before handcuffing him and hogtying his legs. Sergeant Koon later testified at trial that King resisted arrest and that he believed King was under the influence of PCP at the time of the arrest, causing him to be aggressive and violent toward the officers. Video footage of the arrest showed that King attempted to get up each time he was struck and that the police made no attempt to cuff him until he lay still. A subsequent test of King for the presence of PCP in his body at the time of the arrest was negative.