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                                                                                COVER STORIES, Page 26

LOS ANGELES RIOTS

L.A. Lawless


The violence sparked by the King verdict reveals racial divisions
that have plagued the city for years

By DAVID ELLIS -- Reported by Jeanne McDowell, Sylvester Monroe
and James Willwerth/Los Angeles


    In the beginning, there was righteous indignation. Just
three hours after the King verdict was announced, thousands of
shocked black residents of South Central Los Angeles gathered
at the First African Methodist Episcopal Church. Speaker after
speaker denounced the injustice and alienation that are part of
their everyday life. Each community leader acknowledged that
institutions designed to protect law-abiding citizens had failed
them this time, but still some appealed for calm. "Look beside
you," said Los Angeles city council member Mark Ridley-Thomas.
"These young African Americans are not in the streets."

    But it was already too late. By the time the two-hour
meeting broke up, the first fires had been set. As weary
parishioners left the prayer meeting, some were shot at by
rioting thugs. "Nothing you're talking about is going to do any
good," one young man told the departing crowd. "Come with us --
let's burn."

    Most of the destruction was limited to the depressed South
Central area, a 46-sq.-mi. part of town plagued by gangs,
poverty and the drug-dealing criminals who dominate life there.
Not surprisingly, it was the besieged black community that
suffered the most. In a bid to protect their businesses from the
rioters' wrath, a number of shopkeepers desperately posted signs
declaring that their stores were BLACK OWNED. In many cases, the
signs were ignored by looters and arsonists who destroyed the
shops anyway.

    For more than 48 hours, an urban nightmare came true as
hatred ruled the streets. During that time, parts of the city
virtually ceased to function. Hundreds of thousands of citizens
were sent home from schools, offices and public facilities. On
orders from city hall, all professional sporting events were
suspended until after the weekend; N.B.A. play-off matches
involving the Clippers and the Lakers were rescheduled, as were
baseball games at Dodger Stadium and Thoroughbred races at
Hollywood Park.

    Almost immediately after the rioters took to the streets,
Angelenos experienced the brutality of mob rule. At 6:30
Wednesday evening, an airborne television camera captured the
beating of Reginald Denny, a white truck driver who made the
mistake of stopping at a red light in the neighborhood where the
first riot erupted. At least five black men pulled Denny from
his sand truck, bashed him with the vehicle's fire extinguisher,
punched him and stole his wallet. Another fired a shotgun into
him at close range. As a blood-soaked Denny called for help, he
was hit with beer bottles and karate-kicked in the head. The
whole macabre scene, like a mirror-image replay of the King
beating, was broadcast live on a local TV station. Denny was
eventually rescued by four black bystanders and taken to a
hospital, where he underwent four hours of brain surgery.

    Many residents assumed that the mayhem would be restricted
to the South Central neighborhood, considered a no-go area by
middle-class whites. But by midday Thursday, fires were breaking
out in scattered areas all across Los Angeles. In a racially
mixed neighborhood just west of downtown, looters and arsonists
hit stores, including the upscale I. Magnin on Wilshire
Boulevard. Nearby apartment buildings caught fire. "We pick up
from one fire and go on to another," explained fire captain Mike
Castillo shortly after evacuating 15 residents from a burning
building. Castillo's four-man crew stayed on the job for 48
hours straight, tracking arson activity as it moved north and
west through the city.

    On the first night of rioting, a local man watching
Castillo's crew put out a fire at a nearby grocery was gunned
down by a sniper and hospitalized. In the warm spring weather,
fire fighters were forced to don flak jackets to protect
themselves from attack.

    The firepower wielded by gun-toting gang members and
frightened citizens also hindered law-enforcement efforts.
Traffic was snarled on one South Central street after a car
careened out of control when a motorist was killed by a sniper.
Fears that random gun battles would break out in the downtown
office area led businesses to dismiss their employees for the
weekend by Thursday afternoon. Several roadways were cordoned
off by police to prevent destruction from spreading north to
Hollywood and Beverly Hills from the poorer regions of the city.

    Though the King verdict clearly sparked the explosion, the
black community's rage had long been building. Citing numerous
incidents, black leaders charged that local police forces had
systematically brutalized and mistreated blacks.

    Three years ago, for example, black private investigator
Don Jackson videotaped his interrogation by Long Beach cops
after a routine traffic stop. Although one of the officers was
recorded shoving Jackson's head through a plate-glass window,
a jury could not reach a decision as to whether this was an
excessive use of force. During the 1970s, 16 blacks died as a
result of choke holds administered by Los Angeles police. Police
chief Daryl Gates defended the use of the procedure at the time,
suggesting that blacks had some anatomical weakness that made
them especially vulnerable to that method of restraint.

    Just as Gates was the target of protests following King's
beating, he found himself accused of slow response -- and worse
-- in his handling of last week's violence. In large measure,
the riots got out of hand because the 7,800-strong police
department was slow to respond to many of the initial
disturbances. Although Gates had earlier indicated that $1
million had been set aside for police overtime, the force was
virtually invisible in the early hours of the rioting, allowing
many looters to smash storefronts and torch buildings with
impunity.

    Lee's Market was one of the many stores to be cleaned out
by looters. Dozens of black and Hispanic men, women and
children emerged from the jagged front windows laden with
groceries as an L.A.P.D. cruiser moved past the area, its
occupants, vastly outnumbered, making no attempt to intervene.
"They should go and destroy Beverly Hills," said one rioter.
"Hey, the police don't even bother to stop." A minute later,
someone lit a match, and what was left of the store went up in
flames. Watching the carnage, neighborhood resident Verdis
Barnes expressed rage over the King verdict: "The video tells
it all. They didn't have to do him like that. But these people
should have gone somewhere else to do this."

    After nightfall, police responded only to life-threatening
situations, escorting fire fighters but standing a safe distance
from rampaging gangs as they cleaned out stores in dozens of
malls. Gates initially claimed that his force was simply
overwhelmed, but his department had not identified potential
trouble spots and did not have enough officers on standby for
riot duty as needed, which is standard procedure for some
big-city forces, particularly those that have experienced racial
unrest.

    Other law-enforcement units were also slow to react.
Though California Governor Pete Wilson deployed about 2,000
National Guard troops on Wednesday evening, it took almost 24
hours for the extra men to reach the streets. They were followed
by hundreds of California highway patrolmen on loan from other
parts of the state. By the time President Bush dispatched 4,500
federal troops to the area at week's end, the violence had
largely abated.

    Some speculated that Gates, who is despised by the black
community, was deliberately holding his men back. "They want us
to burn ourselves out," claimed a caller to KJLH, a black radio
station that opened its airwaves to listeners after the city
erupted. Another caller noted that residents in white
neighborhoods were able to deploy private security forces to
keep the rioters at bay. "Who can we call to get someone to
protect our house?"

    According to one community source, commanding officers
were allegedly told at a preverdict meeting not to react too
quickly to disturbances. Sources speculate that the order may
have been given because of concern that a heavy police presence
too soon would provoke even more unrest.

    Not all the black rage was directed at the police force.
Many rioters specifically targeted Asian-owned businesses.
Relations between the black and Asian communities have been
tense for years, mainly because of a perception that Korean
merchants have been exploiting poor neighborhoods by
establishing shops in ghetto areas while refusing to hire blacks
to work in them. A particularly bitter episode occurred last
year when grocer Soon Ja Du was convicted of killing 15-year-old
Latasha Harlins, whom she accused of stealing a $1.79 bottle of
orange juice. Although an in-store video camera clearly showed
that Du had shot Harlins in the back as she left the store, the
trial judge sentenced the Korean to just five years' probation.

    Last week store owners in the prosperous Koreatown
district, five miles north of the initial flash point, were
ready for action. In the absence of effective police protection,
the merchants resorted to vigilante tactics. At a large mall
featuring a food outlet, a pharmacy and a liquor store with
Korean-language signs, men with pump shotguns and high-powered
pistols defended their businesses. A barricade of shopping carts
was arranged in the parking lot, which was patrolled by armed
Koreans in a four-wheel vehicle. As a pair of looters approached
the mall, the guards fired 12-gauge rounds into the air to chase
them away. Elsewhere a security guard was killed defending a
Korean-owned store from attack.

    The area's most prominent blacks had virtually no ability
to restore calm. Johnnie Cochran, a prominent lawyer who helped
outlaw use of the choke hold, said, "It makes no sense, because
they are destroying their own communities. I don't think
there's anyone who can talk to these people now. They will only
understand the measure of force, the National Guard or the
police being assertive."

    Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley deplored the King verdict at
the Wednesday-night church rally when he angrily declared, "We
have come tonight to say we have had enough!" But the following
night, a subdued Bradley appealed for order on a broadcast of
the Arsenio Hall Show and issued a warning: "Don't break the
law, or we will put you in jail." But most Los Angeles viewers
knew that was a promise the mayor could not keep.

    The week's violence may have boosted the chances that a
referendum calling for comprehensive police reform will be
endorsed in next month's primary. Known as Charter Amendment F,
the measure calls for civilians on the police-review board and
a five-year limit to the police chief's term, subject to a
one-time reappointment by the mayor. Gates, who had a virtual
lifetime guarantee of employment before he announced his
retirement effective this June, opposes the new law. When last
week's violence erupted, in fact, Gates was at a reception in
the affluent suburb of Brentwood, trying to raise money to fight
the proposal.