In 1992, Los Angeles City experienced one of the worst citizen disturbances, riots. After the Civil Rights Movement many riots exploded in Los Angeles due to police-community relations. After the end of the Civil Rights Movement tension between the African-American, Latin, and Korean communities and the Police force simmered in American cities all across the country because many kept experiencing police brutality in their communities.
The 1980’s brought much more tension to the problem, Ronald Reagan economic policies initially proved less successful than its partisans had hoped, particularly when it came to a key tenet of the plan: balancing the budget. By early 1982, the United States was experiencing its worst recession since the Great Depression. Nine million people were unemployed, many businesses closed, families lost their homes and farmers lost their land. In Los Angeles, many citizens experienced a high rise in gang activity, drugs and violent crime to the poorer neighborhoods of Los Angeles.
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Another main contributing factor, in the same month of the King’s beatings, a Korean store owner in South Los Angeles shot and killed a 15-year-old African-American girl named Latasha Harlins, who was accused of trying to steal orange juice. What was discovered after, she was trying to pay for the juice with money she had in her other hand. She was not trying to steal the juice. The store owner was put on probation and given a $500 dollar citation for killing the 15 year old.
Aggressive efforts to exert control by the Los Angeles Police Department fostered a belief among minority communities that its officers were not held liable for abusive police actions. In 1991, a videotaped beating of motorist Rodney King aired on television. Rodney King had been beaten by four LAPD officers and were found not guilty of assaulting King. The four officers were found not guilty. The non-guilty verdict led to the LA riots of 92’.
The early 1990s were a difficult time, especially for South Central. South Central was quickly changing. During the 1980s, many immigrants began to move in and the Crack Epidemic, and other drugs had a terrible effect on the area. Also, 1991 and 1992 were the worst on record for crime. In 1991, gang homicides accounted for just over 36% of all murders in Los Angeles. In 1992, the year of the riots, the murder rate was the highest in LA in history. At 1077 murders, it was close to three times the rate today. Many of these deaths came from gang violence in South Central.
Right before the riots, there was a massive gang truce between the Bloods and the Crips throughout the three Watts’ projects. This came as a result of unity against the police. During the LA Riots the first riot began on the the intersection of Normandie and Florence ave. Around 6:45PM., gang members and other civilians were seen pulling people from their cars and beating them as a response to police-community relations. The riot was several days of violence , arson, and across Los Angeles City in response to the Rodney King verdict and other cases that faced police brutality from the 80’s to the 90’s.
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