The Cases Of Rodney King's The Nineties In America

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Since the early 1990’s, a major spotlight has been directed at all police officers for their use of excessive force. In the cases of Rodney King, Abner Louima, and Amadou Diallo, we can see that the officers involved were guilty of using excessive force but were protected by their respective courts in some cases. In their book The Nineties in America, Tracy Iron-Georges who works for the Salem Press and Milton Berman who is a professor at the University of Rochester review the major events that took place during the 1990’s. One of the events took place on March 31 1991, when Rodney King was pulled over after leading the police on an 8-mile chase. After King was told to lie on the ground and in not complying with the orders, he was tasered twice and was beaten by four police officers of the LAPD suffering many broken bones. …show more content…

Harring presents the case of Amadou Diallo in her article The Diallo Verdict: Another "Tragic Accident" in New York 's War on Street Crime? she explains how the four officers involved in the shooting were acquitted of all charges in this case. Amadou Diallo was shot 19 times after four white police officers thought Diallo fit the description of a “young black male” who was wanted for a rape a year before the shooting occurred. (Harring 9-10) Finally, John Kleinig in his article Civil Rights and Civil Liberties: Videotaping the Police presents the case of Abner Louima who suffered police brutality after he was already in custody. Abner Louima suffered a ruptured bladder and colon, several broken teeth, and blood clots, and required three surgeries after he was arrested outside a New York club. (Kleinig) These are some of the more notable cases that prove what happens when the police use excessive force. Even though the officers believed they were justified in what they did, most of them were found guilty of using excessive

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