The Los Angeles race riots of 1992, triggered by the acquittal of four LAPD officers who had brutally beaten a Black motorist, Rodney King, form the background to this story. The attack on King occurred on March 3, 1991, and was followed thirteen days later by the killing on March 16, 1991, of fifteen-year-old Latasha Harlins by a Korean American convenience store owner, who received only probation and a fine. Decades of resentment had been building in the Black community against racial discrimination and police targeting, and the unfair verdict in the Rodney King case, despite conclusive videotaped evidence from a bystander who filmed the incident, was the catalyst for the riots, which lasted six days and resulted in more than sixty deaths and thousands of injuries. The focal point of the rioting was the intersection of Florence and Normandie in South Central Los Angeles.
“A riot is the language of the unheard.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.
* * *
When Antoine knocked on Damon “Football” Robbins’s door, Football held a pigskin in one hand and a forty-ounce bottle of malt liquor in the other. It was nearly one o’clock in the afternoon, and Judge Stanley Weisberg had already announced that the jury had reached a verdict in the trial of the four police officers accused of beating Rodney King, and that the results would be made public at three o’clock on the dot. Football had been sitting in the living room all morning, watching the news as it came in. As soon as he saw Antoine at the door, he high-fived him and said, “This time we’ve got ‘em! The police are gonna have to pay for what they’ve done. Fifty-seven blows to an unarmed Black man who was already on the ground. And it’s all on tape.”
“You sure there’s gonna be a conviction?” Antoine asked. “Soon Ja Du shot a Black teenage girl in the back, and it was all on tape that time as well. She claimed that Latasha was stealing a bottle of orange juice. They found the poor girl with two dollars in her hands when they examined her corpse, but the judge only gave Soon Ja Du a suspended sentence, and she didn’t serve a day in jail! A Black man gets more time in prison for kicking a dog. I’m not so sure Rodney will get justice.”
But Football was still jubilant.
“This time, the charges are going to stick, my friend. The whole fucking world has been outraged by this senseless beating. Look at the television screen. They’re playing the tape again. It’s for everyone to see. Rodney’s on the ground, and they keep hitting him with their batons, hitting him on the head. I’m sure they were taunting him, calling him ‘nigger’ and ‘boy.’ At the trial, the defense counsel made the ridiculous claim that the cops were afraid Rodney would rise from the ground and overpower them. Tell that story to a child, Antoine. How could an intoxicated, unarmed Black man do anything against almost twenty fully armed cops with their pistols, Tasers, and billy clubs? Just look at the screen again. There’s no doubt in my mind that the jury will vote to convict.”
“I don’t know,” replied Antoine, shaking his head. “After all, they moved the trial from multiracial Los Angeles to lily-white Simi Valley for a reason. Don’t think for a moment it wasn’t done for a racist purpose, to ensure the jury wasn’t made up of Black people.”
“It’s all on tape,” Football objected.
“I hate to tell you this, Damon, but I wouldn’t be surprised if all four police officers were acquitted. In fact, I expect it. Don’t you realize the jury is made up of ten white jurors, one Hispanic juror, and an Asian American juror! Not a single Black person on the jury. How are you going to get a unanimous guilty verdict from twelve jurors given a group with such a racial makeup? Even a single vote against conviction can hang the case.”
“I don’t care who’s on the jury,” replied Football. “This time, the evidence is so overwhelming that even a Martian would find the four cops guilty. Don’t forget, Soon Ja Du was found guilty by a jury. The judge commuted her sentence and gave her probation.”
Antoine shrugged. “Well, just last week, the Korean woman’s sentence of probation was affirmed on appeal by a unanimous court. And let’s not forget that even the jury’s conviction of manslaughter was too lenient, because she’d committed a cold-blooded murder. The cards are simply stacked against us, Damon. We Blacks live in a police state. Don’t forget all of us who have been killed by police chokeholds. Don’t forget the fact that the cops are always acquitted, assuming they’re even charged. No one cares about police brutality as long as it’s kept in our precincts.”
Antoine paused momentarily.
“Now, throw me that football,” he commanded. “Let’s see how strong that arm is.”
Football tossed the pigskin at Antoine.
“You were pretty good at football, weren’t you, brother?”
“I wasn’t all that great.”
“Word is that you were destined for the NFL, that college scouts were already looking at you. Everybody knows it. What happened, homie? Why’d you give up on football?”
“I guess it was too much beer and too much partying. Too many trips to Moon’s liquor store in the middle of the afternoon. That fucking Korean kept me boozed up, and I missed practice from time to time.”
“You can’t fault the man for doing his business. If you missed practice because you got loaded, I’m afraid you have no one to blame but yourself. Just saying, Football…”
“I don’t think so,” Football replied. “If Kim Sung Moon hadn’t sold me malt liquor when I was a minor, I’d never have gotten hooked on those eight-balls.”
“That’s why Rodney got into trouble too. He drank too much malt liquor, which led to his arrest. I tell you, they are going to acquit the cops, just as they always do, blaming everything on the alcohol Rodney’d been drinking.”
“This time is different,” protested Football. “All on tape, thanks to that bystander, George Holliday, who filmed it all. It’s a slam-dunk case for the prosecution.”
“The killing of Latasha was on tape, too, and it didn’t make a whit of difference.”
“Look, I’m not saying the cops don’t literally get away with murder when they kill a Black man. I know it happens all the time; I’m not a fool. All I’m saying is that in this case the jury will convict because there’s no rational alternative. Other cases involved he-said she-said situations where the evidence could be disputed. I don’t deny that jurors – even Black jurors – sometimes give cops the benefit of the doubt when there are conflicting accounts of what happened. But no human being can find the cops innocent when their brutal beating of Rodney is on tape for all to see!”
“What you call he-said, she-said arguments sometimes involve laughable claims by the police that somehow stick. Police Chief Daryl Gates himself claimed that when chokeholds are applied to Black men, their veins and arteries don’t open as quickly as those of ‘normal’ people – meaning whites – so they die in disproportionate numbers. Don’t doubt for a second that white authorities won’t believe their lying eyes when it comes to our complaints of excessive force against the cops. Those motherfuckers get away with everything, no matter what the facts are. Even if Rodney had been killed – and he nearly was – they wouldn’t care. What we’ve seen is a modern-day lynching. And we are too powerless to do anything about it.”
Football and Antoine continued to drink malt liquor bought at Moon’s Liquor Store – located at the intersection of Florence and Normandie – until three o’clock in the afternoon. By then, a dozen other men had joined them in what many thought would be a celebration, bringing a lot more beer and a little pot. Some of the men were nervous, but all of them held out hope for a conviction. Rodney would get justice at long last. The police would finally get their just deserts for having beaten Rodney as if he were an animal and for beating so many other homies. But it was not to be. As everyone in Football’s living room fell completely silent, the group waited for the jury foreman to deliver the jury’s verdict on the claims of excessive use of force.
On the first count, the verdict is not guilty.
On the second count, the verdict is not guilty.
On the third count, the jury is hung — deadlocked.
A few of the men in Football’s living room hollered in disbelief. More than one wept silently.
Football took his bottle of malt liquor and threw it against the television screen, pulverizing it into a thousand shards of glass.
“This shall not pass,” he said. “Those motherfuckers ain’t seen nothing.”
Then he and his furious friends made their way to the broad intersection of Florence and Normandie, large as a plaza, where more than a hundred outraged Black residents had already gathered to protest.
* * *
Ramon Sanchez had a busy day on Wednesday, April 29, 1992. From the early afternoon, he’d been overseeing workers loading tons of sand into the trailer of his eighteen-wheeler. The Hispanic workers at the Gravel Supply plant in Inglewood called him el güero, because Ramon was white-passing – blue-eyed and blond-haired – even though he hailed from Guatemala.
Given the events of the day, it did not take long for Ferguson, the supervisor at the Gravel Supply plant, to broach the issue of the jury’s acquittal of the four cops who had beaten Rodney King.
“What do you think?” Ferguson asked Ramon. “Do you think the acquittals were justified?”
“That’s a tough question,” replied Ramon in his Spanish-accented English. “The tapes are pretty intense, but I’m not so sure Rodney King didn’t bring it on himself. You know he wasn’t a choirboy, don’t you? By the time of his encounter with the police, he’d been in prison for two years for robbing a Korean store owner and attacking her with a long pole. I heard it on the news yesterday. He fled from the cops because he was on parole and knew he would be sent back to prison if he was caught driving drunk. And I don’t think the police should have to use kid gloves when dealing with an unruly suspect, because then they end up endangering themselves. The rules are not hard to follow. When a policeman orders you to the ground with your hands behind your back, you obey instantly. But Rodney continued to resist, forcing the policemen to react. I think part of the reason is that he was drunk. That’s why he taunted the police.”
“I’ve heard it’s the police who taunted him,” Ferguson responded, “calling him ‘nigger’ and ‘boy.’”
“Don’t forget that drunk as he was, he forced the police to chase him as he drove at suicidal speeds of a hundred miles per hour on surface streets with thirty-five-mile-per-hour limits, caring nothing for red lights or pedestrians. He endangered not only the police but also innocent motorists. I feel no pity for him; no, I don’t. Don’t you know his blood alcohol content was twice the legal limit after he drank eight-balls all night? That’s a slang term for forty-ounce Olde English 800, which has much more alcohol than ordinary beer. I know that because my sixteen-year-old son Javier drinks it too when he hangs out with his buddies on the streets. No, sir, I don’t see Rodney King as some sort of racial martyr. I see him as a thug.”
“So you don’t have a problem with the acquittal? You know Black people are furious.”
“I hate to say it, but many Black people act in the same way that Rodney did. And I’m not a racist; those are just the facts. They resist arrest, even when faced with police who come at them with overwhelming force. It is not surprising that many Blacks end up making charges of police brutality against the police, as they sometimes invite it. But if other people acted in a similar manner, they would be subjected to the same rough response.”
“Don’t you think,” asked Ferguson, “that police brutality targets Black people? I’d think that as a minority yourself, you’d be more partial to their grievances.”
“The problem goes beyond the Blacks. There is a general defiance of authority today. Hispanics also have unclean hands in such matters and are incarcerated in disproportionate numbers, not because of their race but because of their crimes. I need only point to my own son, Javier. Last week, I found him in the living room of my house, smoking marijuana. When I ripped the joint from his hands and chastised him for his behavior, he pushed me hard against a wall, causing me to collapse to the ground and bruise my shoulder. It makes my blood boil to remember it. You wouldn’t see a boy treating his father that way in Guatemala. Such disrespect! Like when Rodney King threw a kiss and shook his butt at a female police officer during his arrest. If Hispanics are arrested in outsized numbers, it is because they deserve it. And don’t forget, many of them are here illegally to begin with. The laws of the United States must be respected.”
“I for one,” said Ferguson, “think that police racism is a reality. I work daily with Hispanic laborers who bow their heads and follow directions blindly. I’ve worked with them closely for over twenty years and have never had cause to complain. They work hard, do all they can to ensure their children get ahead, and bother absolutely nobody. Sure, the white populace complains about illegal aliens. But the illegal alien bogeyman is a fiction meant to justify abuse against all dark-skinned Latinos. Shit! You’ve been spared because you look whiter than I do.”
“No, sir,” responded Ramon. “I’ve been spared because I follow all the rules. There’s an old Spanish saying, ‘Respect another, and you will receive respect yourself.’ That’s what I’ve tried to teach my son all his life. But I’m afraid he will eventually be in the crosshairs of the police, given that I know he’s also selling pot.”
And then Ramon began to weep silently for himself and for his son. He was sure his son Javier was hurling himself headlong in the wrong direction. But he soon composed himself and got into his truck to deliver the sand. As he drove, he didn’t turn on the radio, too distressed for music. Soon he arrived at the corner, where so many protesters lined the streets – more than two hundred – that he could not get past the intersection and had to stop his truck lest he run over people. He didn’t immediately realize that Florence and Normandie was the epicenter, the place where the uprising had already begun. Even before Ramon met his fate, more than thirty white motorists had been pelted with rocks and beer bottles as they crossed the intersection. But Ramon would soon be treated worse than all, worse than he had ever imagined.
* * *
Germaine Wilson – tall and lanky, with a high forehead, close-cropped hair, and a face that gave little away – had just been fired from his job at a large law firm and had woken up in a foul mood. He knew the old saying from law school days about young Black lawyers at prestigious firms – last to be hired, first to be fired – so he wasn’t entirely surprised, though it still stung to think that from his first day at Smith Wynne Richardson the partners had considered him an inferior affirmative action hire. That, Germaine told his girlfriend Candy, was the irony of affirmative action: it might allow more Black students to be admitted to law schools, but it also gave law partners a language with which to justify their racism by saying young Black associates had not earned their positions at the firm through merit but had benefited from special treatment instead. At Smith Wynne Richardson, the new associates who thrived were the ones given plum assignments by the partners. He was sure he hadn’t been given such assignments because he was Black and thus had no means to prove himself.
The words “affirmative action hire,” Germaine said to Candy, were among the many tropes used to keep us in our place. In the days of W.E.B. Du Bois, the first Black person to earn a PhD from Harvard, no one could disparage his gifts by saying he was the beneficiary of special treatment. In twentieth-century America, it was one of the indignities of African American life that we always had to prove ourselves again and again, regardless of our accomplishments.
Like most people in South Central, Germaine had been glued to the TV from the moment Judge Stanley Weisberg announced that the jury had reached a verdict in the trial of the four officers accused of beating Rodney King. More than he wanted to admit, he needed a guilty verdict, because it would prove, at least for one afternoon, that all men are equal before the law. But he had little hope of justice in the case and was sure the jury would acquit. After all, the nearly all-white jury had been cherry-picked to ensure an acquittal, as most of them believed Rodney’s beating was deserved for his defiance of authority. And Simi Valley couldn’t have been a better venue for the cops, as its population was almost entirely white and many policemen lived within the district.
“I knew it!” cried Germaine as soon as the acquittals of the four policemen were announced on his television. “You can have the abuse on film and still get no justice for Black lives. We’ve been hunted for centuries. Why would anything be any different now? The threat of the police is everywhere.”
“That’s why I think,” said Candy, “you shouldn’t seek work at another white-shoe law firm but instead open a law practice in the neighborhood. If all the Black professionals leave the area, conditions will never improve. I’m sure Rodney King will find a well-established plaintiff’s attorney for a suit against the city, given his notoriety, but most African Americans don’t have that opportunity. You can have an outsized impact in South Central if you just hang up your shingle here. The folks are in desperate need of legal aid, and I’m not thinking just about cases related to police brutality.”
“Are you saying that’s all we can do? Practice poverty law, stay in the ghetto, keep your head down… Are you saying, with James Baldwin, that the white man seeks to prevent the Black man from aspiring to excellence while wanting him to make his peace with mediocrity, and that the African American man must constantly oppose the idea that he’s inferior, in the way they see him? That’s like saying Black baseball players should have stayed in the Negro Leagues, or that Black basketball stars should not be allowed to shine in the NBA. Have you ever wondered why Black athletes have been so successful in sports while they continue to struggle in the professions and in commerce?”
“Why?” asked Candy. “Is it because they’re taller?”
“It happens because prowess in sports is not subjective. Many of the greatest prizefighters are Black, and no one can pretend they got there through charity. Nobody can claim Muhammad Ali is an affirmative action hire. Even Arthur Ashe had to be undeniable before white America would call him excellent. And no one can say a Black baseball player is not gifted when he hits home run after home run. Just look at Willie Mays. Just look at so many others. It’s nothing like the world of commerce, where banks flat-out deny African Americans the loans they need to start a business. How are they supposed to succeed? White loan officers finance merchants of their own race, helping their businesses flourish. Our success in sports blows apart the lie that we’re lazy, undisciplined, and shiftless. You don’t excel at basketball, football, or boxing without discipline. In sports, we’ve thrived — and that’s something no one can take from us — in a way they simply can’t in the professions or in business.”
“It’s not all that dire,” Candy replied. “The mayor of Los Angeles is a Black man. You’re seeing everything through the prism of your pain and the frustration you feel because, despite all your efforts, you’ve been unfairly laid off by your law firm. But there are opportunities outside the ghetto if you look for them. I think you’d make the best use of your abilities by staying in the neighborhood.”
“Look at the television screen,” said Germaine suddenly. “Look! The cars are being pelted with stones! I tell you, I wouldn’t be surprised if mass violence erupts soon. The masses have been waiting for justice in the case of Rodney King for months, and they didn’t get it. This undeserved acquittal only confirms what many Black Angelenos already believe: that the police are an occupying force and that white people see them only through the prism of their own racism. It’s not surprising that they refer to Police Chief Gates’ officers as agents of the Gestapo. Black people believe they are under constant threat of being beaten, humiliated, or even killed by the police. They fear that doing nothing in the face of such injustice would only justify police brutality and placate all the racists who feel Rodney King got what he deserved. People can only take so much abuse before they explode. Baldwin had warned that rage denied an outlet would not simply disappear: ‘The Black man in our midst carried murder in his heart; he wanted vengeance.’ The water has been simmering for so long, Candy. It’s about to boil.”
Germaine spent the rest of the afternoon watching television news analysis. He saw images coming out of his own neighborhood, the intersection of Florence and Normandie, two blocks away. The protesters at that corner of South Central had been growing hour by hour as more and more Black residents sought a venue to vent their anger. By six o’clock in the afternoon, there were more than three hundred protesters, too many for the police to contain. And then the worst of the violence erupted. Initially, the Black teenagers merely used bats, stones, and beer bottles to smash the windshields of certain vehicles at the intersection – all of them cars driven by whites, Asians, and light-skinned Hispanics – but the angry youths had not yet physically harmed the non-Black motorists. Then things steadily got worse as the mob began to pull motorists from their vehicles to rough them up. During the course of the afternoon, several Hispanic families were pulled from their cars and beaten by angry Black protesters chanting, “Mexican motherfuckers, Mexican motherfuckers, get out of our neighborhood forever!” Then a group of white nuns appeared at the intersection and were met with stones and jeers.
“Candy,” Germaine cried out in a frantic voice as scenes of the carnage appeared on television. “The protesters have begun to do what I feared, to mete out punishment on their own terms, however misguided they may be. My God, they’re pummeling that man to death! Since the courts didn’t give them justice, they’re going to seek their own. But we can’t let that happen to a fellow human being, no matter what the circumstances. Bring me my jacket. I need to go to see what I can do to stop the mayhem.”
“I thought you were angry with white people. And don’t you think it would be dangerous to face such a crowd? You’re just one man, Germaine.”
“Not so angry that I would condone such acts of violent hatred, but angry enough to fume when I think about how the authorities made unemployment the norm for more than half of the men in South Central, ages sixteen to sixty-five. If young Black men had dignified jobs, they wouldn’t be on the streets today throwing rocks and shattering car windows. The havoc in South Central wouldn’t be happening if the kids were given a chance to have an ounce of self-respect, if they were allowed to believe their lot in life could be better than the stunted, hopeless misery of their fathers – their defeated, addicted, or absent fathers. Even the great James Baldwin was once so consumed by rage after racist humiliation when a white waitress at a New Jersey restaurant said, ‘We don’t serve Negroes here.’ Baldwin had reached a breaking point and wanted to strike back: ‘There was nothing on the table but an ordinary water-mug half full of water, and I picked this up and hurled it with all my strength at her.’ I know it might be dangerous, but I’ll just have to take my chances. I have to at least try to stop what’s happening there before it gets much worse.”
Germaine and Candy then witnessed a horrific scene. One of the white men unlucky enough to turn onto those streets when they were filled with furious throngs had been assaulted by half a dozen Black men. One of them smashed a brick or a cinder block against his head, leaving his face and chest covered in blood. There was no doubt in Germaine’s mind that the man was in danger of death, and the young unemployed lawyer decided to try to rescue him immediately, come what may. He realized he was imperiling himself, as anyone might pounce on a Black interloper trying to save a white man, but he made short shrift of the dangers ahead. Candy decided to join him, and soon they were pushing through the crowds, trying to reach the big rig where he had been assaulted.
* * *
Ramon inched forward, honking his horn loudly, trying to cross the intersection at Florence and Normandie, but it was impossible to move past the boisterous people. At first, he wasn’t alarmed, imagining he was in the midst of a peaceful protest given the acquittals of the four police officers who had beaten Rodney King. Certainly, he had no fear of danger to himself, as he had nothing to do with the trial’s outcome. But then the people began to pelt his truck with rocks and banged loudly against it in an act of collective rage. A large stone shattered the windshield of his truck, cracking it into a thousand pieces. Then a youth smashed the side window next to the driver’s seat with a crowbar and pulled Ramon out of the truck.
Football, wild with bloodlust, told him, “Motherfucker, it is time to pay! The chickens have come home to roost. Did you think we’d never get justice?”
Ramon was stupefied and didn’t understand what was happening. It felt as if a hundred hands were tugging at his clothes and limbs, dragging him aimlessly through the protesters, who chanted without cease, “No justice, no peace!” “No justice! No peace!” Then he collapsed to the ground and felt kicks to his head and torso as he tried in vain to protect himself with his arms. He had no doubt he was about to be killed and crossed himself in despair, muttering a prayer to the Virgin of Guadalupe. Then the kicks ceased, and he was allowed to stand so that Football, who appeared to be the leader of the crowd, could address him. Ramon was already bleeding heavily and completely dazed, with no idea why he had been chosen for such torment.
“White boy, how does it feel to be on the other end of the baton?” cried Football as the crowd roared in approval. “Did you think Rodney’s beating would go unpunished? Now you know how he felt, white boy. I wish I could inflict the same punishment on all of you out there.”
Football laughed joyously, as if he were at a celebration. The young man who had attended church with his mother every week had disappeared.
“I have nothing to do with what happened to Rodney King,” Ramon managed to say. “I’m not even white. I’m Guatemalan.”
“You’re a white boy, all right,” said Football, unmoved. “Haven’t you benefited from white privilege your whole life, every hour of every day? Wouldn’t you have voted to acquit the merciless motherfuckers who beat Rodney to a pulp?”
“I didn’t attend the trial or see all the evidence. I didn’t sit on the jury. I’m in no position to take one side or the other. Now, please, let me go. I’m sorry about what happened, and I understand your anger. But hurting me will do nothing to achieve your justice. I am a simple, powerless truck driver, not even a gringo. I speak with an accent.”
“What the fuck are you saying? What proof did you need? It’s all on the fucking tape. Wasn’t that more than enough? Admit it. You would have voted to acquit no matter what the evidence showed because you’re a fucking white man, Guatemalan or not.”
“Don’t be disrespectful to your elders, boy. You’re just like my son. He sells marijuana and respects no one. I guess in your mind, that means he’s on your side and not considered white.”
“How dare you call me ‘boy’? The police always call us ‘boys.’ That’s how they taunt us in the ghetto to provoke us. That’s how they riled up Rodney King. Don’t you know that’s how the Watts uprising of 1965 started, when the police called a Black motorist a racial slur and ‘boy’ in front of a crowd of Black people? My father is still called a ‘boy’ by the police, and he is sixty-seven. I am a man, motherfucker. I’m a man, and I’m going to prove it to you.”
“I didn’t mean anything by it,” replied Ramon. “Certainly nothing racist. I was thinking of my own son’s defiance of authority.”
And then Football smashed a cinder block into Ramon’s head, fracturing his face and skull in more than ninety places. Somehow, despite the blow, the truck driver staggered back toward his vehicle. Football did a victory dance as if he had scored a touchdown, mugging for the TV cameras filming everything from a helicopter overhead. He was satisfied that the whole world would now see that he had exacted vengeance, that everyone would realize that, in the end, the crime against Rodney had not gone unpunished. Then he flashed gang signs with his hands and began to laugh sardonically as he chugged from a bottle of malt liquor one of his buddies had handed him to celebrate his deed.
A sixteen-year-old African American girl named Vanessa took pity on Ramon and guided him back to his truck. She had been fiercely protesting what she saw as a travesty of justice and was incensed by the acquittal, but she didn’t believe protesters should engage in wanton violence against innocent white men and Korean shopkeepers, let alone against their Latino neighbors. Unfortunately, Ramon could not leave the site, even though the crowd, having seen his condition, had decided to leave him alone. He was simply too groggy to drive, and the windshield had been pulverized, making it impossible to see through. At that moment, two Black residents appeared on the scene to help, risking their very lives to save the truck driver. They were Germaine Wilson, the unemployed attorney, and his girlfriend, Candy Peters. They understood that human beings, regardless of race, can commit crimes as part of a mob that they would never commit as individuals. But neither could drive a big rig, and time was of the essence. There was no doubt in their minds that unless he was taken immediately to a hospital, the man would soon die from the blows to his head.
Then another Good Samaritan arrived, Dante Jackson, a former minor-league basketball player, six feet eight, broad-shouldered and calm under pressure. Germaine asked nervously, “Who are you?” He feared Dante had come into the truck’s cabin to finish Ramon off.
“Name’s Dante Jackson,” the large man replied. “I figured you needed some help managing the eighteen-wheeler. I’m a truck driver myself. Who are you?”
“I’m a Black man who doesn’t believe in violence, no matter the cause. The attack on King was a grave crime, but I don’t believe in an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. A lynching is a lynching, no matter who the victim is. I don’t believe in killing a man for the crime of being white.”
“Well, you’ll need to guide me. I can’t see through the shattered windshield, so you’ll need to look out the side window and tell me where to go.”
“How are we going to get past the crowds?”
“They’ve probably moved on to another victim,” said Dante. “They figure this guy is as good as dead. Some are appalled by what happened. They didn’t come to the protest intending to kill anyone, so they’ll clear the way for us. I can tell you, many women are weeping over the senseless attack on this man, and many of us are shaking our heads in disbelief. You don’t defeat your enemies by becoming like them.”
Sure enough, people dispersed to let the truck pass through. Germaine guided Dante safely to the hospital, just three miles away. The attending emergency nurse told Ramon apologetically, “You must hate us after what happened.”
But Ramon managed to reply, “How could I? Black people rescued me.”
* * *
Reverend Bobby Carter was not surprised by what was happening in the streets. He had accepted the verdict with a sense of helpless silence, but he was certain that his neighbors would not take it so easily and would erupt in rage. For his part, the minister wept copiously when he learned on TV of the acquittals of the four policemen. He remembered well the Watts uprising of 1965, when he was an ex-convict, eagerly participating in the mayhem with implacable self-hatred. Those race riots were also fueled by fury at perceived racism and the excessive use of force by the police. Marquette Frye, a Black motorist suspected of drunk driving, had been struck in the face with a baton while being arrested in the presence of his Black neighbors, and a wave of retaliatory violence had followed. Six days of violent protest followed, even though the police assault on Marquette had been nowhere near as brutal as the relentless beating of Rodney King. Rodney had received fifty-seven blows from the police batons; Marquette no more than three. The furious crowds had gone after the white man then as well. Protesters stoned cars and attacked anyone who entered the intersection where the police brutality had taken place. It was one of the largest uprisings in American history, yet it paled in comparison to what Reverend Carter expected to happen after the acquittal of the four police officers who had so violently subdued Rodney King. This time, the assault had been filmed, and the African American minister thought it was an excessive use of force, plain for anyone to see.
By the time of the 1965 uprising, Reverend Bobby Carter had already spent two years in prison, mostly for selling dope, but also for an attack at a liquor store that netted him a clean five hundred dollars. When he left prison, he was a young man full of rage, detesting white men, blaming them for all his troubles, and drinking without cease. If it weren’t for them, he would not have been forced to avoid penury by dealing drugs or stealing. If it weren’t for the white man, his neighborhood would not be bereft of economic opportunities for a Black youth with ambition – no jobs, no businesses, nothing but grinding poverty. He had been at the intersection of Avalon Boulevard and 116th Street when Marquette Frye was beaten. So when the 1965 riots started, he was a willing participant in the maelstrom that ensued, pelting police vehicles with rocks, brutalizing white motorists, and setting white-owned liquor stores on fire. He even shot a white policeman in the head, a secret crime for which he was never charged or tried.
Then one night at a neighborhood drug fest, he overdosed on heroin. The drug almost took his life, and he would forever remember his mother’s desperate, unceasing prayers to the Lord for his deliverance. When he emerged from his semi-comatose state, he was an entirely new man. He accepted a humble position as a janitor at a university outside Watts and swore before his God to love all his fellow men, even the whites he had so detested in the past. Soon he began preaching from storefront churches, trying to prevent the teenagers of Watts from falling into the cesspit of despair from which he had fled, and telling them they were precious in the eyes of Jesus. Never again would he engage in acts of violence or deal in drugs. Never again would he see a young man veering off the righteous path without intervening. By the time of his thirtieth birthday, he already had his little church in South Central, the Mount Zion Episcopal Church, not too far from the intersection of Florence and Normandie. People congregated at his church weekly, singing praises to the Lord. For a long time, Damon “Football” Robbins was among that congregation, but that was before he became a monster.
Reverend Carter had prayed without ceasing for a guilty verdict for the four white policemen who had brutalized Rodney King, in part because he felt it was just deserts, but mainly because he dreaded what would follow if there was an acquittal. He sensed that people in America were becoming increasingly polarized, with most Black people thinking guilt was beyond obvious and most whites saying it was up to the jury to determine whether a crime had been committed. Sure, there were some white liberals who clamored for a conviction, but the vast majority of whites were willing to give the cops the benefit of the doubt. What white people didn’t realize, thought Reverend Carter, was that Black Angelenos didn’t see the beating of Rodney King as a single incident, but as irrefutable proof of something they were painfully aware of – the ongoing and generalized mistreatment of Black men at the hands of the police. By the time of the acquittals, all Black society was a powder keg ready to explode. What happened in the next few hours was critical. Either violence would be nipped in the bud, or the whole city would be set ablaze. The expectation of a guilty verdict among the Black population had been mounting for many months, and now that it hadn’t happened, the people’s outrage would grow like a snowball. The reverend himself was incensed by the fact that the policemen walked free, but that didn’t mean he condoned retaliatory violence.
By the time Reverend Carter saw the image on TV of Ramon’s head cracked open by a cinder block, the minister thought his worst fears were becoming a reality. “Forgive them, Lord, for they don’t know what they’re doing,” he prayed, echoing Christ. He was shocked when he realized that the man who had smashed the white victim’s head was none other than Football, who had attended services with his pious mother for years and whom everyone once thought would have a promising football career. Nevertheless, Reverend Carter had always considered despair a sin against God, and he was not about to despair now. Instead, he decided to go to the intersection of Florence and Normandie himself to try to knock some sense into his people. If he could cauterize the cancer then and there, perhaps it wouldn’t metastasize. After all, many of those engaged in the protests attended services at his church and would be open to his entreaties. And many of the others were Christians as well, as South Central was filled with churches. So he put on his clerical collar and his best black shirt and began to walk to the intersection where the dreaded insurrection was beginning. He couldn’t drive there, as his wife had taken the car, but walking briskly he felt he could arrive in half an hour. Maybe he would not have time to rescue Ramon, but the reverend feared other victims would soon follow.
* * *
Kim Sung Moon arrived early in the morning at his liquor store on Florence and Normandie to stock the shelves with bottles of beer and malt liquor that had just arrived. He wasn’t paying much attention to the news, thinking the Rodney King beating was a matter between whites and Blacks and that the Korean merchants had nothing to do with it. He well knew that the Black residents didn’t much like the fact that he had set up shop in their neighborhood nor that liquor stores in the area were disproportionately owned by Koreans. But as far as Kim Sung Moon was concerned, the feelings were reciprocated. Shoplifting was a constant problem, and twice he had been held up at gunpoint by Black men.
Kim Sung Moon had heard the complaints before. Mothers came in sometimes, tight-lipped and furious, asking why he sold so much malt liquor and so little food. Once, one of them had pointed to the empty shelf where milk might have been and said, “This neighborhood has children too.” Kim Sung Moon had looked away and returned to the register.
His job was not to protect Black people from becoming drunks but to sell beer. He made a lot of money selling beer. The mothers complained. The city did nothing. Kim Sung Moon kept his license, and Black mothers went unheard. His store carried a wide array of alcoholic beverages but no fresh fruit or produce, no eggs or milk. All he sold was booze. It was not uncommon to see Black youths, even minors, drinking outside Moon Liquor in the middle of the day, giddy from so much beer and malt liquor. Nor was it uncommon for him to sell beer to winos who were already intoxicated and begging for money outside his store.
The demands of a coalition of mothers to cancel Kim Sung Moon’s liquor license fell on deaf ears. In vain, the mothers argued that alcohol abuse led to crime, and in vain they said habitual drunkards could not find gainful employment. At all events, the Korean shop owner didn’t think taking away his license would make any difference. South Central had more than seven hundred liquor stores, and the alcoholics would know where else to find their beer. By contrast, there were only about forty grocery stores for a population of over 1.3 million people, and very few restaurants. There was only one supermarket in the entire area. To use a common expression of the time, South Central could only be described as a “food desert.”
At the beginning of the day on April 29, 1992, Kim Sung Moon had brisk business at his store at the corner of Florence and Normandie.
There were watch parties all over the area as people gathered to watch the news, expecting a verdict in the Rodney King case soon, and foot traffic at Moon Liquor was greater than ever. There was a long line of people waiting to buy malt liquor or beer at the store, and Kim Sung Moon figured the Rodney King verdict was good for business, never anticipating the mayhem that would follow, nor that Korean shop owners like himself would be the greatest targets of the riots. He couldn’t have imagined that the protesters – Black and Hispanic – would cause $400 million in damage to Korean-owned businesses, nor that the police would do nothing to protect them. He knew their purchases, their brands, their habits, their small debts. He did not know their grief, not realizing that the commutation of Soon Ja Du’s sentence by a white judge after Latasha Harlins’s murder was as grating as the beating of Rodney King.
Kim Sung Moon had seen the crowds swell outside his liquor store, but at first he wasn’t alarmed. He thought Black residents were simply venting their rage against the white man, believing the acquittal in the Rodney King case was a travesty of justice. Soon, a group of thirty people began chanting outside his door, and he felt afraid for the first time. “Korean motherfucker,” they cried out, “you’ve exploited the community for years and now it’s payback time.” He locked the doors immediately and pressed a button under the counter to call the police, but the police never came. Soon, one of the angry youths hurled a brick through the plate-glass window of the liquor store, and before he knew it, his store was full of angry people. He told them to take all the beer and malt liquor they wanted, free of charge, hoping they wouldn’t torch his store. And sure enough, the mob, led by Football, were taking every carton of liquor on the premises. Word spread that there was beer for the taking at Moon Liquor, and more and more people invaded the store. Kim Sung Moon had a pistol under the cash register but decided not to use it. He could kill a single looter, but never subdue such a large crowd. So he watched in stupefied silence as the crowds, after having stolen all the liquor, began to trash the place. The glass in front of the beer refrigerators was smashed to smithereens, and soon he detected the unmistakable smell of gasoline. Soon he found himself escaping from the fire as the store was set ablaze, a tiny fish thrust into an ocean of angry sharks.
Once outside the store, the mobs pounced on him. He felt the crowd pushing him violently toward the center of the intersection. Some of them began to punch him, and he fell to the ground, his face covered in blood. The crowd then began to pull at his clothes, tearing at all his clothes until he was stripped and helpless. They then began to kick him with implacable fury, as if he were at fault for all their troubles. Kim Sung Moon felt the fear of death for the first time in all his forty years. Suddenly, Football appeared on the scene and used a spray can to paint Kim Sung Moon face, torso and body black… Then, Football directed the mobs to disperse, preparing to kill Kim Sung Moon himself.
“Korean motherfucker!” he screamed, loud enough for everyone to hear. “Who’s Black now? Didn’t you celebrate when the court set Soon Ja Du free? She killed the lovely Latasha. Don’t you profit from our misery and feed our addictions? Well, today’s the day for you all to pay the debt! You’ll pay for every penny you’ve swindled from the people. Koreatown will burn! You’ll see. The fire of our wrath will consume it!”
Football began to deliver blow after blow to Kim Sung Moon with his baseball bat, crushing the man’s shoulders and fracturing his legs. But Football didn’t attack Kim Sung Moon’s head with his bat, for he had a different plan.
As he doused Kim Sung Moon with gasoline, the crowds realized that Football meant to incinerate him. Soon, three men surrounded the Korean shopkeeper with torches, ready to ignite him as soon as Football gave the word.
* * *
When Reverend Carter arrived at the scene, he realized he was facing an impossible task. There were about three hundred furious people on the streets, most of them drinking large bottles of malt liquor, and the minister despaired of being able to reach them and prevent the situation from blowing up entirely. In the center of the intersection, he saw people gathered in a circle around two men. One of them seemed familiar. It was Damon “Football” Robbins! The minister couldn’t fail to recognize him. When he saw him standing over Kim Sung Moon, something old and ugly stirred in him. He knew that look. He had worn it himself in Watts. He had called it justice then too. Around them, the protesters were chanting, “Kill the Korean now! Avenge their crimes! Burn him!” Then Reverend Carter realized that Football was accompanied by three men carrying torches. And the sixty-year-old minister couldn’t understand why the liquor-store owner, Kim Sung Moon – he had recognized him too – was the focus of the crowd’s avid rage.
Before Football could complete his macabre deed, Reverend Carter approached him and stood between him and the Korean shopkeeper, who was softly moaning on the ground. The naked man was badly bruised from the blows he had received from Football’s baseball bat, but despite his stupor, he managed to plead his case to the reverend.
“What have I done to deserve the punishment of being burned alive? I realize the people are still angry because a Korean woman didn’t spend a day in prison after killing an innocent Black girl, but I had nothing to do with it. Please, Reverend Carter, for the love of Jesus, please save my life!”
“Get away from that Korean piece of shit!” Football commanded the minister. “He’s not being punished for the Korean woman’s crimes but for his own. Didn’t you say it in church many times? There is a time to heal and a time to kill. Well, we are now in the time to kill. Please step out of the way so I can do this. He’s a menace to all of us.”
“Come to your senses, Football,” the minister said. “What crimes could this humble shopkeeper be guilty of?”
Football gave him a withering look and took another drink from his bottle of malt liquor.
“Kim Sung Moon is guilty of destroying me and many other youths.”
“How have I destroyed anyone?” Kim Sung Moon mumbled on the ground, barely audible.
The reverend addressed Football, “What do you mean when you refer to your destruction?”
“I was a contender,” responded Football, trying to stifle tears. “I had my ticket out of the ghetto. Scouts from several football teams were coming to my games to watch me play. I was the best quarterback to come out of South Central. And that’s where Kim Sung Moon’s greed fucked everything up, because he didn’t see me as a human being. He didn’t give a damn about me.”
“What do I have to do with your football career?” lamented Kim Sung Moon. “I didn’t even know you played football.”
“You didn’t care about me or any of the other brothers. You were willing to poison us with your liquor just to make your filthy money. In fact, you’ve destroyed more of our lives than the police, perhaps even more than the ‘man’. All the homies who gathered in the parking lot of Moon Liquor, drinking eight-balls in the middle of the day, were crippled by their vice, but you didn’t give a damn. You didn’t know, and you didn’t want to know. And you didn’t care if I drank until I was completely drunk, even though I was a minor. How could I keep playing football if I became a habitual drinker? No, sir, you’re not an innocent vendor. You deserve your fate because you ruined the lives of so many of us.”
“Football,” interjected Reverend Carter, “I’ve been in the same position as you, resigned to despair as my only portion. I felt the same bottomless rancor, the same intense hatred for those I saw as my enemies. I even shot a cop in my relentless anger. But through Jesus, I found a way out of my despair and bitterness. I learned that the Lord had destined me for good, not disaster. Show mercy to this man, and the Lord will show mercy to you too. Jesus commands us to love our enemies.”
“It’s in the ‘Our Father’: ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.’” You may not be wrong about what Kim Sung Moon’s store has done here, but killing him will not repair a single life. Spare this man. You must love your neighbor even when he doesn’t love you back.”
“Reverend Carter, please step aside,” said Football. “I’ve made my decision, and I’m sentencing this man to death. There is no need for a white man’s trial, no need for a white prosecutor or judge, certainly no need for a white jury. The people themselves are convicting him for devastating so many young Black lives. The white man ruthlessly pursues any Black person who sells drugs. How are the drug dealers any worse than Kim Sung Moon? He’s wrecked just as many lives. No, sir, it’s high time such men are brought to justice. Either God doesn’t exist, or He is Black.”
And with that, Football gave the order to his men and directed them to torch Kim Sung Moon.
Then Reverend Carter did something Football didn’t expect. He threw himself on top of Kim Sung Moon and hugged him tightly.
“If you decide to set this man afire, you’ll have to kill me too. I won’t tolerate such depravity. Do the Christian thing and spare this man. Do it for your mother, Football. You know how distraught she’ll be if she learns you’ve done such a dreadful deed.”
“What shall I do?” Football asked the people around him.
“Torch them!” cried a large group in unison, their voices rising like a chant. The minister could hear others murmuring for mercy, silently praying that the two men be allowed to live. “Preach it, reverend!”
“You’ve heard the people’s order,” Football said harshly. “Get going. It’s time to end the lives of these two men. The minister is trying to interfere with justice, so he’s guilty too.”
But the three men carrying the torches balked at his request to incinerate the minister. How could they kill a man emulating Christ, a man willing to risk his very life to save another?
“Let them go on their way,” said one of the men to Football. “Moon Liquor has been burned to the ground and Kim Sung Moon will never return to this neighborhood again. Why sully our souls in seeking revenge?”
“And you’d be telling other Korean liquor store owners that they won’t be punished for living off our misery. I, for one, will go into Koreatown tonight and burn down as many of their businesses as I can.”
Football paused, shook his head in frustration, and clicked his tongue.
“Look,” he went on, emphasizing each word, “The hour of mercy has come and gone. It’s been almost thirty years since the 1965 Watts uprising, and things are even worse today. All of us are Rodney King, another person ruined by alcohol and then tortured with impunity by the police for the crime of being drunk.”
Football looked at the protesters, their cries of support ringing out.
“Burn Koreatown to the ground! Burn Koreatown to the ground! Let them know they can’t escape our wrath!”
The crowd was like a seething pot. A frail, petite woman with her hair in a bun edged through it. By the time she reached Football, she was sobbing, her eyes red and swollen like blisters. Carmichael. Her son. Her heart might explode any moment from pain and grief.
She knew about anger, the same anger that inflamed the people against the Koreans. But beyond being an angry, grieving mother, she was also a woman of deep and abiding faith. That meant she knew anger and belief couldn’t be left alone together in the same room.
“Football,” she cried.
“I was one of those people, too. Do you think I wasn’t glad when you attacked that Korean man? Do you think I didn’t wanna see him suffer? My own child, my beautiful Carmichael, just sixteen, killed in a drunk-driving accident ‘cause of who? Kim Sung Moon … sold him liquor even though my boy was already drunk.”
She began to wail, as the details of that terrible afternoon returned to her, every detail as if it had just happened.
“Kim Sung Moon saw my son, who was so boozed up he could barely walk, get into his car and leave, but he said nothing. Sure as hell he’s responsible for my son’s death. I’ve wanted nothing but revenge, and I watched you hurt him—”
She paused, her eyes drifting over the sea of Black men and women who had come to draw blood.
“But then Reverend Carter showed up, and everything got muddled in my head. A crime’s not gonna fix another.”
“And then came that moment when the reverend threw himself on that man. Every cell in my body cried out, Oh my Lord! Here was a man willing to die like Jesus on the Cross to save the life of a sinner, just as Christ saves hordes from the flames of hell. In that moment, something softened in my heart. Maybe it’s the seed of forgiveness? Isn’t that what Jesus taught us in the Our Father? I’m no angel, and I’m no Reverend Carter. I’m still struggling to overcome the bitterness in my heart—but I believe that’s what a Christian must do: to pardon.”
“Please, Football, for the love of God, stop. Don’t burn down the city. The violence ain’t gonna take you anywhere nice. It’s just gonna mess up your life and get you killed.”
Some of the protesters began to mutter, thinking the grief-stricken old woman was in the right. They then started to cry out, “Peace! Peace!” imploring Football to desist from his destructive intentions.
But he was unmoved.
“All of you who believe the Black man has turned the other cheek for far too long,” he cried, “and all of you who believe our sons and brothers have been killed by too many eight-balls, follow me and help me burn down this city. We have enough gasoline to incinerate every business in Koreatown!”
And it was true. Two gas stations near the intersection had been looted by the crowds. They quickly made their Molotov cocktails, filling empty bottles of Olde English malt liquor with gasoline. Others siphoned gas from parked cars and used it for the same effect. Football knew Koreatown was only three miles away and that everyone could reach it by walking north in less than an hour.
Despite the forlorn mother’s words, the majority followed Football, with Antoine always at his side, and soon set Koreatown ablaze. A few refused to join the incineration of the Korean district, but it didn’t matter. More than five hundred people joined Football on his path of destruction and wrath. With neither the police nor the fire department intervening, it proved much easier to burn down Koreatown than anyone had imagined. Soon, they were destroying every Korean business in their wake: restaurants, bars, massage parlors, photography studios, furniture shops, a place selling wedding dresses…
Their biggest prize was the Seoul Supermarket, not a mom-and-pop store like those in South Central, but a sprawling business that filled an entire block. The market wasn’t even guarded by a single security guard, and Football and his crew soon began pouring gasoline all over the building. Others shattered its windows and hurled their Molotov cocktails into the supermarket, triggering a great conflagration. Soon, the spiraling fire lit up the sky, visible from a great distance, consuming the entire block and glowing brightly sixty feet above the ground as thick plumes of smoke rose even higher.
The perpetrators were proud of their deed, crying out in celebration, “Burn, baby, burn!” as they watched the business go up in flames. Like the fuel in their Molotov cocktails, their rage had been bottled up for years, ready to explode when the wick was finally lit. That wick was the acquittal of the policemen who beat Rodney King to a pulp. Yes, all who were complicit in the crime were getting their just deserts! And the murder of Latasha Harlins by Soon Ja Du over a fucking bottle of orange juice was being avenged at long last!
Football was the ringleader, telling the others where to go, always in front, always the first to attack before those behind him were given the green light to follow. Antoine was always right behind him, following the undisputed leader of the crowds. Soon, they stood at the California Supermarket at Fifth and Western Avenue, with Football in the lead as always. But something different happened this time. As he prepared to douse the business with gasoline, a volley of gunfire resounded, causing the group to scatter. Korean shopkeepers having seen all the other fires set in Koreatown, had decided to protect their business themselves and were waiting for the attackers on the rooftop of their supermarket, rifles in hand. And then bang! A bullet struck Football, and he fell. The only one who didn’t abandon Football to his fate was Antoine, who loved him like a brother.
“I guess we showed ‘em,” murmured Football as he began to cough up blood. “We showed the motherfuckers that you can never keep us down.”
“Yes, we showed them,” Antoine assented miserably, cradling Football in his arms.
“Now they’ll know you can never beat us with impunity. Next time the police beat or kill us, they’ll know what’s coming. Isn’t that so, Antoine?” Football said feebly.
“You’re right,” Antoine replied, his eyes brimming with tears as he tried to staunch the bleeding with his jacket. “Given what you’ve done tonight, they’ll think twice because they’ll know that if a Black man is killed or injured for no good reason, all of Los Angeles will burn.”
“We really had to do it, didn’t we? If the courts don’t give us justice, what else could we do? Let me know, Antoine. Do you think I can die with a clear conscience? You think about such things when you’re about to lose your life.”
“Your fury was justified.”
“Yes, I know, but were my actions? …everything I’ve done.”
“Don’t second-guess yourself, Football. If the jury hadn’t acquitted the four cops, you wouldn’t have resorted to violence. Doesn’t the white man say it? The ends justify the means…I understand what you did. After Rodney, after Latasha, after so many of us were killed by the police, there was simply no other way. Have you heard the Mexican expression? The innocent pay for the sinners. There was no way to reach Police Chief Gates.”
Football died in Antoine’s arms without a word.
Shirin Abedinirad, Heaven on Earth, 2014. Installation art, Treviso, Italy. Presented at Fabrica, the Research Center of United Colors of Benetton, the work draws on Persian architectural traditions and Islamic geometry to transform a staircase into a mirrored passage of light, where sky becomes ground and reflection opens a momentary vision of paradise. Artwork courtesy of featured artist Shirin Abedinirad.
