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Details in a Washington Post article of January 25, 1998, by Lou Cannon - "The King Incident: More Than Met The Eye on Videotape" - EXCERPTS:

The King incident began at 12:30 a.m. on March 3, 1991, as the California Highway Patrol husband-and-wife team of Tim and Melanie Singer was patrolling Interstate 210, the Foothill Freeway, north of Los Angeles in a marked car. Melanie Singer was driving, heading west . . .
The driver of [a] Hyundai ignored flashing lights and screaming sirens of the highway patrol car, prompting Tim Singer to radio for help . . .
The Hyundai ran a red light at Van Nuys and Foothill boulevards, nearly causing a collision . . .
By the time it finally stopped, just beyond the intersection of Osborne Street and Foothill Boulevard, LAPD units were participating in the chase, and an LAPD helicopter was hovering overhead, its spotlight focused on the scene below.
The Hyundai's driver, 25-year-old Rodney Glen King, had pulled to a stop near a darkened entrance to Hansen Dam Park.
[Fast forward . . . out of the car,] King then meandered away from the Hyundai, talking to himself and smiling, and went to his knees in front of the car occupied by [LAPD Officers] Powell and Wind. "He got on all fours like a dog," Wind said . . .
[LAPD Sgt. Stacey Koon arrived on the scene . . .] While Koon was unholstering [a] Taser, Melanie Singer was shouting at King to show his hands. King ignored her . . .
[Fast forward . . . after Sgt. Koon used a Taser twice, in order to subdue King . . .]
King once more groaned and collapsed but braced himself on his right elbow and again began to come to his feet. From [Officer] Powell's perspective, King did a 180-degree turn and stared at him and [Officer] Wind from a distance of six feet . . .
[As] King struggled to regain his balance, when a man named George Holliday began videotaping the scene from the balcony of his apartment across the street [about 90 feet away].
It was also the moment, or very close to it, when the frustrated [Sgt.] Koon ordered [Officers] Powell and Wind to deliver power strokes with their batons, telling them not to hit the suspect in the head.
And it was the moment before the moment when King charged wildly in Powell's direction looking, as Wind put it, "like he was trying to imitate a mean dog."