The Los Angeles Riots and the Second Amendment
by Lee Aldridge
It was Thursday , April 29th , 1992 ; a warm , muggy day in Los Angeles , and as usual the city ’ s skyline was partially obscured by a thin grey blanket of smog . Nevertheless , I could easily make out a distant plume of smoke , spiraling skyward from points unknown several miles south of my position . I had taken off work early that day and was in the process of driving our daughter to her appointment at Kaiser on the corner of Sunset Blvd and Vermont Ave . in LA . I had just turned the corner off Los Feliz Blvd and was heading down hill on Vermont toward Kaiser when I spotted the smoke . My initial thought centered on how close the fire was and if the commotion was going to impede my way to Kaiser . What I didn ’ t know was that I was witnessing the beginning of the many arson fires that accompanied the looting , murder , and mayhem that was sparked by a Simi Valley jury which had just exonerated four L . A . policemen indicted for police brutality against Rodney King . In case you have forgotten , Rodney King was the man who , intoxicated and allegedly high on PCP , was stopped by L . A . police following a high speed chase on March 3 . 1991 . He acted strangely and resisted arrest and what followed was a phalanx of LA police officers beating him into submission . A nearby resident had videotaped the incident and released his video for a local TV station . From that point on , the video was aired almost daily by the mainstream media up to and especially on the very day immediately following the announcement of the verdict . I was unaware of the announcement when our daughter and I departed our home in South Pasadena for the late afternoon appointment . But I soon became aware as I overheard animated discussion about it between staff at the doctor ’ s office . My daughter ’ s visit was the last appointment of the day for the doctor , and by the time it was concluded the clinic staff were hurriedly closing down and preparing to leave . There was no panic , but an unmistakable sense of apprehension was in the air : we were all eager to get home . As we made our way to the parking structure , the faintly acrid smell of smoke was in the air and as we drove off it was clear that there were now other fires burning besides the one we spotted on our way in . Long after the riots were quelled , the LA Times estimated that more than 3600 arson fires were set over the duration of the riots , destroying more than 1100 buildings in the process . Turing back onto Los Feliz Blvd ., there was a young disheveled man on the corner , holding a home made sign emblazoned with the prophetic words “ No Justice , No peace .” It sent a chill up my spine , but it also angered me as I thought to myself “ What the hell does this kid know about justice or peace ?” The afternoon traffic in LA is always heavily congested , but this day it was horrendous . It seemed as if everyone in LA was pouring out of the city at that very moment . It took us nearly 90 minutes to traverse what was typically a 30 minute journey . Trouble had been anticipated or perhaps more precisely “ inflamed ” by the mainstream media ’ s obsessive replaying of the video taped beating while “ predicting ” possible riots if the policemen were not found guilty . Three days earlier , on April 26th , I had purchased a 12 gauge pump action shotgun at a local gun shop in Pasadena . It was a low-cost no-frills home defense type firearm . Although I was familiar with firearms and had fired some of my uncle ’ s hunting rifles as a young kid , I had never owned my own real firearm other than a Daisy BB-gun which I stopped using as soon as I entered high school ( Daisy BB-guns are for kids !). What I did not know when I purchased the shotgun was that there was a mandatory 10- business day waiting period before you could take possession of your firearm . So as it turned out , the six -day long LA riot ended several days before I was able to pick up my shotgun . After returning home that evening , we were glued to the TV watching L . A . come apart at the seams . From our back deck of our hilltop house in S . Pasadena , we could see the smoke billowing out from multiple locations over the central LA area and the air was rent with the screams of police and / or fire truck sirens . There is an old saying that the police are the thin blue line between civilization and anarchy . But as we watched shocking TV images of armed Korean / Asian shop keepers in Korea Town engage armed looters and rioters
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Pono Press , May 2013 , Page 8