Latasha Harlins
*On this date in 1991, Latasha Harlins was killed. Thirteen days after the Rodney King beating, a store owner shot and killed 15-year-old Black teenager Harlins in the back of the head.
The merchant, Soon Ja Du, a 49-year-old Korean woman who, with her husband, owned the Empire Liquor Market Deli in South Central LA, was charged with murder. She was later found guilty of voluntary manslaughter, but Judge Joyce Karlin granted the defendant probation. The store was later firebombed.
