Coverage Around the Country

The verdicts were news across the nation. Here is a sampling of the coverage from newspapers around the United States.

BOSTON GLOBE

The headline: “LA calm after two guilty verdicts”

Editorial comment: The editorial lauded the verdicts. “The conviction of two officers in the Los Angeles police brutality trial is more than a good and principled verdict. It shines like a beacon for all to see as an affirmation that federal remedies can succeed when local venues fail.”

DETROIT NEWS

The headline: “Split decision in King verdict”

Editorial comment: “Our sense is that this jury got it pretty much right. In the great tradition of Anglo-Saxon justice, the jury exists not just to apply the law but to bring a broader sense of right and wrong to the decision-making process. The videotape, plus the later taped remarks of several of the officers and their apparently callous disregard for the badly injured King, added up to a persuasive case that something had gone wrong.”

SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER

The headlines: “2 L.A. cops guilty” was the banner headline for the Examiner’s Extra on Saturday. “All calm after the verdict” ran in the Sunday edition.

Commentary: Noted columnist Rob Morse: “America was ‘waiting to exhale,’ to borrow the phrase of author Terry McMillan. We can take another breath or two before the officers’ sentencing and the trial in Reginald Denny’s beating this summer. Then we’ll be holding our breath again as America does periodically in matters racial.”

NEW YORK NEWSDAY

The headline: “LA verdict II, 2 Guilty, 2 Not”

Commentary: Columnist Jimmy Breslin wrote: “Politicians and ministers were seen actually applauding the news that people were going to prison. Clinton the President for whom life is a primary, suddenly appeared on television to pounce on a couple of mean and slow-witted local cops and say that now, finally, America can right itself.”

NEW YORK TIMES

The headline: “2 of 4 Officers Found Guilty in Los Angeles Beating”

Editorial comment: “A city and nation that were alarmed over the beating and torn by riots after last year’s state trial are entitled to a new national, collective sense of relief that due process has prevailed.”

WASHINGTON POST

The headline: “Jury Convicts Two Los Angeles Officers in King Beating.”

Editorial comment: “These verdicts reaffirm that an officer’s badge is no shield from liability for misconduct. The convictions also constitute an important commentary to citizens who believed after the Simi Valley verdict that their standing in this country had little meaning. Now Los Angeles must continue to move toward healing the terrible divisions this case has opened.”