Officers Followed LAPD Policy In King Beating, Expert Testifies

LOS ANGELES - The defense in the trial of four Los Angeles police officers yesterday chipped away at prosecution contentions that the defendants violated department policy when they beat and subdued Rodney King.

Jerry Mulford, a former instructor at the Los Angeles Police Academy, testified the police department had not taught officers the "swarm" technique of subduing suspects. A prosecution expert witness testified earlier that the officers should have swarmed King instead of beating him with batons following a high-speed car chase two years ago.

Mulford was the first of three use-of-force experts that Sgt. Stacey Koon called to show the force used in the King arrest, while brutal, followed LAPD guidelines. The witness is a 20-year LAPD veteran who has retired since testifying for the defense in the officers' trial on state charges last year.

"He's the first brick in the wall showing why officers do what they do," said Ira Salzman, Koon's attorney.

But the bricks were slow to fall into place for the defense on a day in which the jury was sent from the courtroom for long stretches while attorneys argued points of law.

"We survived the prosecution case just fine," said attorney Harland Braun, who represents Officer Theodore Briseno. "The question is whether we can survive the defense."

Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Clymer scored points for the prosecution in cross-examining police witnesses whose recollections conflicted with the events shown on the videotape of the King beating.

Under prodding from Clymer, Officer Joseph Napolitano acknowledged he had testified at a federal grand-jury proceeding that King was never combative while officers beat him.

This statement was omitted from Napolitano's direct testimony, in which he said he thought King was under the influence of the drug PCP because he did not go down when struck with darts fired from an electric stun gun.