2 L.A. Police Officers Had Practiced Baton Lessons : King case: The accused policemen had a training session on technique just before the alleged assault, their supervisor testifies during the trial.

Two Los Angeles police officers accused of beating motorist Rodney G. King practiced the “pool-cue jab” and “power chop” with their batons less than an hour before the alleged assault, according to testimony in Simi Valley Thursday from their supervisor on the night of the incident.

Sgt. Richard S. DiStefano, then an assistant watch commander in the Foothill Division, told jurors that Officers Laurence M. Powell and Timothy E. Wind were instructed to strike their batons against a wooden post ringed with tires before going on patrol.

Wind, 31, a rookie recently out of the academy, had excellent form, DiStefano recalled.

But Powell, 29, accused of delivering most of the 50-plus baton blows on King, “appeared weak” when performing the power chop and was ordered to demonstrate the technique again with more force.

“He struck in an ineffective manner,” said DiStefano, a 13-year veteran. “We had him do it again and use a little more power in his swings.”

Prosecutors hope the testimony will demonstrate the emphasis that the Police Department places on the use of force by its officers.

But defense attorneys maintain that it shows that the policemen who hit King were only following orders.

“The officers are taught to not tap lightly, (but) to use force, and that’s the training?” attorney Michael Stone asked.

“Yes,” DiStefano replied.

“And you tried to get that across to Officer Powell?” Stone asked.

“Yes,” DiStefano said.

Prosecutors implied that officers were schooled more in the technique of force than in the circumstances under which to use it.

“Is it possible that a person can use a baton correctly, but at the wrong time?” Deputy Dist. Atty. Alan Yochelson asked.

“We are bound by rules and regulations,” the sergeant said.

The power chop consists of holding the baton by the side handle and the long end and thrusting it at a subject’s collarbone, elbow and wrist, DiStefano said.

Department training warns against using the baton on the head, spine or kidneys except in cases when an officer’s life is in danger.

Powell and Wind are accused of clubbing King after the Altadena motorist’s car was stopped March 3, 1991, in Lake View Terrace, where the incident was videotaped by a resident. Officer Theodore J. Briseno, 39, and Sgt. Stacey C. Koon, 41, also are charged in the beating. All four have pleaded not guilty.

Also on Thursday, an emergency room physician at County-USC Medical Center testified that he examined King about six hours after the incident and noted facial cuts, a broken cheekbone and fractured leg.

However, Dr. David Giannetto, who was asked by defense attorneys to point out the injuries on a human skull, said he had no way of determining how they had been inflicted.

Giannetto also contradicted earlier testimony of Pacifica Hospital emergency physician Dr. Antonio Mancia on whether King appeared to be under the influence of PCP.

Mancia said Wednesday that he did not believe that King was intoxicated.

But Giannetto said Mancia told him King was being transferred from Pacifica to County-USC “solely because the patient needed to be observed for possible PCP intoxication.”

Although urine tests later showed no signs of the drug, Giannetto said King appeared mildly intoxicated.

Defense attorneys have contended that the officers believed King was acting violently and feared that he might be on PCP. Prosecutors have said that King might have behaved strangely but did nothing to merit the kind of beating that was inflicted.