officers - The Black Vault

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such an impa.:t that. to do the story. it
ultimately has ro·he a feature l;ilm for the
rest of the wor'lll. Domestically. probably
a mini-series. A three-night mini-series
on him ... That is not all. There will
be a book. "Titerc are really two books,
I should say. There's the making of the
story, and the story. Because the making
is almost as interesting·as the story:"
Banks has an idea in !llind for aT-shirt:
"1 think Mr. K~ng's statement. ..'Can't
we work togellber?' Glen's statement was
a beautif4l statement. And I think that,
with his picture, would be very apropos.''
Meanwhile, Banks is busy writing "cease·
and desist" letters to bootleggers using
Rodney King's face or name without alicense,
and he has an investigator tracking
the pirates down.
All of which leaves Aunt Angela-and,
she says, the rest of the King family-out
in the cold ... We're looking at millions
and millions of dollars," she says. "And
everyone's trying to find out who's doing
what. Everyone except for his own immediate
family. And he can't see this."
With ·books and movie projects and
the multimillion-dollar civil suit all
in the works. King became a valuable
commodity. But his partners soon realized
that he was also a risky investment. In
May 1991 , with the ink still not dry on his
Triple-7 deal, King drove to Hollywood,
where, in a dark alleyway, he engaged the
services of a transvestite hooker. As luck
would have it, two undercover L.A.P.D.
vice cops were watching this particular
prostitute, and they moved in for the
pinch. King tore out of the alley, nearly
.running over one of the cops. He then
stopped a patrol car, told the cops about
the incident, and was arrested for assaulting
a police officer with a deadly weapon .
Lerman maintains that the assault charge
was a setup by the L.A.P.D., which was
bent on discrediting King. For its part, the
state attorney general's office decided
against filing charges. "We felt that it
was a defensible case, considering that
they were undercover and there wasn't a
reasonable conclusion that [King} knew
they were police officers," says Deputy
Attorney General Peggy S. Ruffra, who
handled the ·case. "There was some reasonable
doubt as to whether he was trying
to run over the person or just get the hell
out of the alley.''
Still, nobody denies that Rodney King
was in that alley with that hooker-"I'm
his lawyer, not his conscience," Lerman
says. And soliciting hookers in dark alleys
was not the ideal way for a man with a
VANITY FAIR/JUlY 1992
multimillion-dollar civil suit penl
a~ainst the local police to he spending hi~
lei~ure hour~. King's minders realized it
was imperative to keep him from getting
into any more awkward· circumstances.
But Lerman prefers a different emphasis.
"Rodney King doesn't need a keeper,"
he says. "Rodney King needed protection
from those that would do him harm. And
the fact that he was set up [in Hollywoodj
underscored his vulnerability."
King has told people -he's miserable in
his cloistered life. "He's just- kind of jittery,"
Angela said after a recent visit to
Ventura County. "He asked me to come
out there; he wanted me to sit and talk
with him awhile. He gets lonesome, and I
odney King
. . . '' .
IS a VICtim,
Lerman says, "and
my intention
is that Rodney King
never become ·
political fodder?'.
know how it is-you know, your family
not around."
But Lerman has convinced King 1hat he
needs his lawyer's shroud to survive.
"He's mindful, because I've told him that
there are people out there that know their
place in history could be assured-if they
took a shot at him," Lerman says. "I
have to take Rodney King and .•. say,
This is what's good for him. Not good for
him because he likes it, or he agrees with
this or that. I enjoy a dialogue with him
that's unique."
Lerman says that he has made King
"part of my life," and that he has spent
"hundreds of thousands" of dollars of his
own money on the case so far. Lerman's
colleagues and competitors aie in awe of
the effort. "I mean, he's basically put
King on a salary," says one. "He seems
like he doesn't have any other cases. It's
quite remarkable."
The tight rein has clearly accomplished
several crucial goab. If King·~ lift: is rt:ally
in danger. it ha~ 1-.t·pt him -.afe ~~·far.
And it has kept away other law~ t'J'~.
"Tht:re were many attorney~ cha~ing him
down. trying to Slllicit the case. trying to
dissuade him from continuing to have
Lerman represent him," says Rentzer.
Lerman has also successfully kept at bay
leaders of the black community who have
sought to give King a more public role in
confronting racism. "Rodney King is a
victim," Lerman says, "and my intention
is that Rodney King never become political
fodder, never become ammunition for
somebody' s agenda."
I
t's safe to guess that Rodney King was
a reluctant volunteer when he made his
famous plea for peace outside Steven Lerman's
office two days after the cops' acquittal.
"He was terrified," says James
Banks. Reporters and TV crews, two hundred
strong, had assembled. An L.A.P.D.
helicopter hovered overhead. Los Angeles
and the nation were waiting to hear from
the man in whose name the city was being
burned. Dozens of people had already
·died, and although the National Guard
and Mayor Bradley's dusk-to-dawn curfew
had quieted the town, the wrong
signal fr.om Rodney King could easily ignite
another explosion. In fact, someone
from Bradley's office cal1ed Lerman just
before King's appearance for assurances
that King would do nothing to heighten
tensions.
Wearing a blue jacket, 'blue slacks, and
a blue shirt, King walked into the sunshine
on Wilshire Boulevard and said:
"People, I just want to say ... can ·We
all get along? Can we get along? Can we
stop making it horrible for the old people
and the kids? ... We've got enough smog
here in Los Angeles, let alone to deal with
the setting of these fires and things. It's
just not right. It's not right, and it's not
going to change anything.
"We'll get our justice. They've won
the battle, but they haven't won the war.
We will have our day in court, and that's
all we want .... I'm neutral. I love everybody.
I love people of color .... I'm not
like they're ... making me out to be.
"We've got to quit. We've got to
quit. ... I can understand the first upset
for the first two hours after the verdict,
but to go on, to keep going on like this,
and to see this security guard shot on the
ground, it's just not right. It's just not
right, because those people will never go
home to their families again. And I mean,
please, we can get along here. We can all
get along. We've just got to, just got to.
We're all stuck here for a while .... Let's
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