The first officer to contact Rodney King was a female officer. He used and abused her, triggering the male officers to lose their restraint. All in all, it was a controlled attempt to subdue a VERY DANGEROUS man.
In my opinion, it was the equivalent of figuring out how to make a live capture of a Gorilla (no race comp intended), or a Chimpanzee. These animals, and Mr King, were extraordinarily strong. The animals by nature.
Rodney was buffed up by workouts, and pumped up by adrenalin and Meth. He barely survived, BECAUSE OF the restraint of the Police. Twenty years previously, they would have just shot him dead, and maybe rightfully so.
The cost to the Police and Policing is not worth the relaxed police posture of 2024, that is for sure. We are in more danger from criminals now, than we have ever been, because of the profile of the Rodney King case and of course George Floyd.
The female highway patrolman and her husband, she had pulled her gun on Rodney King when LA PD took over, Koon told her the police were taking over and everyone holster their guns.
King was acting strange in front of her and mocking her by grabbing his buttocks and gesturing at her.
In slow motion video the beating was revealed to meet the training standard and was controlled if I remember correctly, it was not the chaotic beating that the public thought it was.