Countywide : Dismissal of Juror in King Case Denied

Attorneys for three of the four Los Angeles police officers indicted in the Rodney G. King beating urged a judge Thursday to excuse a potential juror who said he remembered hearing that one of the officers had made a racist remark on the night of the beating.

However, Judge Stanley M. Weisberg refused to grant the defense attorneys’ request as jury selection continued at the Simi Valley courthouse. The middle-aged white woman was included among 48 people asked to return next week for further examination.

King was beaten on March 3, and the incident was captured on videotape. Earlier that evening, one of the officers--Laurence M. Powell, who is white--allegedly used his police radio to describe an incident involving black people, which he said was right out of “Gorillas in the Mist.”