The Power of the Situation A week of urban mayhem was ignited by the April 29, 1992 jury acquittal of four white police officers who were captured on videotape beating black motorist Rodney King. The angry response in South Central produced its own brutal footage, most dramatically the live broadcast from a hovering TV news helicopter of two black men striking unconscious with a brick, kicking, and then dancing over the body of, white truck driver Reginald Denny. The final three-day toll of what many community activists took to defiantly calling an uprising, revolt, or rebellion, was put at 53