Posted on 07/29/2003 2:58:07 PM PDT by The Magical Mischief Tour
Los Angeles police go on alert for riots as cop brutality trial ends
Los Angeles police were put on tactical alert as jurors prepared to announce their verdict in a potentially explosive trial of two white cops accused in the beating of a black youth.
"We are on tactical alert now due to the imminent verdict in the trial of the Inglewood police officers," said Los Angeles Police Department spokeswoman Renee Montoya.
The readiness to deploy extra officers to ward off possible violence reminiscent of the 1992 Los Angeles race riots came as jurors early Tuesday reached a verdict on the fate of at least one of the accused officers.
The decision was to be announced at 2:00 pm (2100 GMT), according to court officials.
Jeremy Morse, who has since been sacked from the Los Angeles-area police force of Inglewood and his partner Officer Bijan Darvish have been on trial over an alleged incident of police brutality that outraged the city's black population and raised the spectre of the infamous Rodney King beating.
Morse was captured on amateur video in July last year as he slammed handcuffed black teenager Donovan Jackson onto the boot (trunk) of a patrol car before punching the apparently dazed youth in the face.
The video was repeatedly played on television across the United States, raising ire among minorities communities that said it was an example of daily police violence to which they are exposed.
Morse, 25, is charged with assault under the colour of authority while Darvish 26, is accused of filing a false police report on the incident.
The United States' most widespread and costly urban unrest erupted in Los Angeles in April 1992 in South Central, near Inglewood, after four white policemen were acquitted of beating black motorist King 14 months earlier.
Some 54 people were killed, 2,000 others injured, 1,100 buildings were burned or destroyed and more than one billion dollars of damage was wrought in the violence that has left scars on the second-largest US city.
"We do not know what is going to happen when this decision is announced, but we are here to assist Inglewood police should they need it," Montoya said as police went on alert Tuesday.
Prosecutors in the Inglewood case said Morse was "angry, out-of-control officer," while defence lawyers insist he was defending himself after the then 16-year-old Jackson grabbed his testicles while his hands were cuffed behind his back.
"This case boils down to an angry, out-of-control officer who unnecessarily and unreasonably assaulted an unresisting subject," Deputy District Attorney Michael Pettersen told the court last week.
The prosecutor also said that Darvish was involved in "a transparent effort ... to cover it (the incident) up."
"This is street justice," the prosecutor said. "This was Mr Morse's intent to show his authority and to punish someone who had the audacity to struggle (against) him in his world."
But Morse's attorney, John Barnett, said he was a "police officer simply doing his job" because he punched Jackson only after the teen grabbed the officer's testicles.
"This case is about the use of force, the use of force in the street ... where you don't have the luxury of rewinding the tape," said Barnett.
We won't hold our breath though, will we?
All sarcasm aside, if the media would not give so much attention to these things, they wouldn't grow as big as they do. For crying out loud.. we show these thugs the exact address where the party is going on!! You don't think this helps things along?
Agreed, sure hope so!!
Now the poor police would have to offer to carry the TV for the rioter in the spirit of good race relations??????????
Believe it or not, some attempt is actually being made at this. From the New York Times article on the deadlock/acquittal:
Today, in an effort to prevent such disturbances, dozens of volunteers who had spent months in conflict-mediation training walked around Inglewood neighborhoods advocating calm and inviting residents to a prayer vigil at City Hall.Whether it'll work, I have no idea. It's only 4:30 pm out there now, not exactly prime riot time. (Or is it? When did the 1992 riots start?) But at the same time, I just don't think this incident is anywhere near a Rodney King level. They beat the living sh*t out of King; this kid just got slammed onto the trunk of a cop car and a single punch."We're also sending out e-mails and making calls to hundreds of people who have shown interest, calling on them to promote peace after the verdict," Steve Goldsmith, director of the Centinela Valley Juvenile Diversion Project, said this morning by phone.
There's a line you have to cross to get a group worked up beyond mere anger and into true violent enragement; I don't think today's court results are enough to cross that line.
All the good TVs today weigh too much for one guy to carry anyway. My 32-inch Sony WEGA, which is really just an upper-middle-end set, literally required three huge guys to carry it up a flight of stairs; it must weigh somewhere between 100 and 150 lbs. I don't have a clue what's inside it that makes it weigh so damn much ... lead? Jimmy Hoffa?
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