Stacey Cornell Koon (born November 23, 1950) is an American convicted criminal and former sergeant with the Los Angeles Police Department. He is one of the four police officers who were responsible for beating Rodney King in 1991. He was sentenced to years in federal prison in 1993 for his role in the beating. Rodney King beating On March 3, 1991, in Los Angeles, a high-speed chase was initiated by California Highway Patrol officer Melanie Singer after motorist Rodney King was observed driving a 1988 white Hyundai . The chase ended on the right shoulder of Foothill Boulevard. Koon, the commanding Los Angeles Police Department officer on the scene, and four other LAPD officers (Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind, Theodore Briseño and Rolando Solano) attempted to arrest King. The officers stated that King resisted arrest and Officers Powell, Wind and Briseño had to use force to subdue him, although witnesses denied that King resisted. The incident was videotaped by a nearby resident, George Holliday, who sold it to local TV station KTLA, with the videotape showing King on all fours on the ground while the officers, taking turns tasering and beating King with their batons. As a result of the incident, King was hospitalized with a fractured skull, broken leg, and burn marks from the taser. The station aired parts of the video and CNN aired it the next day. The trial was moved out of Los Angeles to the largely white suburb of Simi Valley, after the judge ruled that untainted jurors could not be found in Los Angeles. The police officers were tried for the use of excessive force in state court in 1992 and acquitted on April 29 that year. Later the same day the 1992 Los Angeles riots began, which resulted in 63 deaths. In 1993, the four officers were tried in a federal court in Los Angeles; Koon and Powell were convicted of violating King's civil rights. The United States Federal Sentencing Guidelines recommended the offenders serve up to ten years in prison. Instead, U.S. District Judge John Davies sentenced the offenders to 30 months. The sentencing was vacated by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in August 1994 for violating the guidelines. In February 1996, that judgment was itself reversed by the Supreme Court of the United States, which found that the shortened sentences were within the district court's discretion. Koon