Start of New King Trial

From the perspective of a foreign resident of the U.S., what is called the “Rodney King” trial is a most disturbing event. What I wonder, would those politically correct people who applaud this retrial think if the officers had been convicted--and the Justice Department was now intervening in the hope of getting them acquitted?

There is also a disturbing duplicity about the expressed reasons for creating this new trial. If the original trial was considered by the Justice Department to be unsatisfactory, that can only be because of its verdict. Therefore, a new trial can have no other purpose than to convict the police officers.

This kind of intervention by a government agency in the legal process is reminiscent of a totalitarian state, and must be fiercely denounced by all those who care about the liberty of the individual.

FRANCIS MEGAHY

Los Angeles