Rodney King found dead in swimming pool

Rodney King, whose 1991 beating at the hands of police led to deadly riots in Los Angeles, has been found dead in a swimming pool today in Rialto, California. King, 47, whose beating was captured on video by a bystander, was discovered by his fiancee, Rialto police Captain Randy De Anda said. The 47-year-old was discovered at his home in in Rialto, California, by his fiancée Cynthia Kelley, at around 5.25am.

She allegedly told friends he had been drinking all day and had also smoked marijuana. She called 911 and officers arrived to find King still in the water. 

They dived in still wearing their uniforms to recover the body of the man who had become a symbol of racial tensions and police brutality in America

CPR was performed on the scene  but he was pronounced dead at Arrowhead Regional Medical Center at 6.11am.

Ms Kelley, one of the jurors in the civil rights case that gave King $3.8 million in damages, is understood to have told friends he had been drinking all day and had also smoked marijuana.

According to TMZ, she was woken by the sound of him screaming in the back yard.

She said that he was naked and banging on the glass.

When she asked him what was wrong, the divorced father-of-three did not respond. Shortly afterwards she heard a splash and went out to discover him in the swimming pool.

There were conflicting reports but police were conducting an investigation based on the theory that he had drowned.

Police Captain Randy DeAnda said that they would await autopsy results to determine whether drugs or alcohol were involved.

He added that no alcoholic beverages or paraphernalia found near the pool.

‘Preliminarily, there do not appear to be any signs of foul play,’ he said

Rev. Al Sharpton said in a statement that King was a symbol of the civil and anti-police brutality movement.

‘Through all that he had gone through with his beating and his personal demons he was never one to not call for reconciliation and for people to overcome and forgive,’

Sharpton wrote. ‘History will record that it was Rodney King's beating and his actions that made America deal with the excessive misconduct of law enforcement.’

The attack that changed it all

Rodney Glen King was 25 years old when he became the symbol of race issues in America. On March 2, 1991, King and two passengers were driving home after having spent the evening at a friend's house drinking and watching basketball. 

At 12.30am, two police officers spotted King speeding in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles. According to King, he refused to pull over as he was on parole for a previous robbery conviction and a DUI charge would have violated this. 

He was pursued through residential areas by several police cars and a helicopter before being cornered. 

After stopping his two passengers Bryant Allen and Freddie Helms were arrested without incident.

King was reportedly two times over the drink-drive limit at this point. 

The first officers to arrive at the scene were Stacey Koon, Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind, Theodore Briseno and Rolando Solano.

King stayed in the car and when he did emerge, acted strangely. One officer ordered him to the ground at gunpoint. 

Sergeant Koon told the officer to step back while Briseno, Powell, Solano, and Wind attempted to arrested King who resisted. He was Tasered in the back and fell to his knees.

George Holliday, who heard the commotion in the street, started rolling a videotape from a distance. King is filmed on the ground, surrounded by the police officers. They then use their night sticks to repeatedly beat King with so-called 'power strokes'. 

King received 56 blows from the batons and six kicks before being handcuffed and having his legs restrained. He was dragged to the side of the road to wait for an ambulance. 

King was taken to Pacifica Hospital having suffered '11 skull fractures, permanent brain damage, broken (bones and teeth), kidney damage, emotional and physical trauma', according to the lawsuit he later filed.  

Mr Holliday took the tape he made to the LAPD who ignored him. His next stop was KTLA television which broadcast the secret footage and led to accusations that the police were racist and excessively violent.

Its broadcast led to outrage, and charges against the police officers. Mr. King later said that as the officers beat him, they yelled, 'We are going to kill you, n*****'.

King almost died after the attack and only survived after five hours of surgery.

But it was the aftermath of the beating that made it one of the most notorious incidents in US history.

Four officers Theodore Briseno, Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind and Sgt. Stacey Koon were brought to trial in 1992.

The court case had been moved to the predominantly white suburb of Simi Valley, California and on April 29, and no member of the jury was black.

Three of the officers was were acquitted while a mistrial was declared for the fourth.

The verdict sent shock waves across the world and prompted catastrophic riots which lasted three days, left 55 dead, more than 2,000 injured and swaths of LA on fire.

As the city was ripped apart by crowds who looted businesses, torched buildings and attacked one another, King made a personal plea for peace.

‘People, I just want to say, you know, can we all get along? Can we get along?’ he asked on the third day of rioting, going off script from the statement planned by his lawyers.

The riots caused more than one billion dollars of damage.

King went on to successfully sue the LAPD, Koon and Powell , two of the officers involved in his beating, were eventually found guilty of civil rights violations in federal court and sent to prison. The other two were acquitted again.

 

Despite the payout, King’s life has been deeply troubled.

In the two decades since the attack, he has been arrested 11 times for domestic violence, assault, drug use and DUI and fought a long battle with alcoholism.

He had spent a stint in rehab, worked as a record company executive and was on VH1’s Celebrity Rehab last year. He had latterly reinvented himself as a boxer.

During a news conference at the time of the riots, King poignantly pleaded, 'Can we all get along? Can we get along? Can we stop making it horrible for the older people and the kids?'

In the years since, King has been arrested numerous times, mainly for alcohol-related crimes, and has made several attempts at rehabilitation, including an appearance on television's Celebrity Rehab.

He received a $3.8 million settlement from the city, but recently said much of that money was lost to bad investments.

This past spring King was on a book tour promoting his memoir, The Riot Within: My Journey From Rebellion to Redemption.

Source: Dailymail