In the spring of 1992 five days of rioting laid waste to South Central Los Angeles, took scores of lives, cost the city more than $900 million in property damages, and captured the attention of horrified people worldwide. Lou Cannon combines extensive research with interviews from hundreds of survivors, offering the only definitive story behind what happened and why.

Official Negligence takes a hard look at the circumstances leading up to the riots. Cannon reveals how the videotape of the brutal beating of Rodney King had been sensationally edited by a local TV station, how political leaders required LAPD officers to carry metal batons despite evidence linking them to the rising toll of serious injury in the community, and how poorly prepared the city was for the violence that erupted.