| 1991 – 1991 Washington, DC riot, Mount Pleasant riot, May 5–9, Washington, D.C. A Salvadorian man was shot and left paralyzed. While he was handcuffed, crowds of youths, most in their teens and twenties, formed and started to attack the police. Around 400 youths fought running street battles with the police for several hours, late into the night. Police cars were torched and several stores looted. Hoping to avoid a second night of rioting, city officials met with Hispanic community leaders the next day. But the meeting did little to stop the violence. By evening, even with 1,000 riot police on the streets, the rioting started again. Police fought with as many as 600 black and Hispanic youths, some with bandanas over their faces. By Tuesday night, after two nights of rioting, the curfew reduced the disorder; only isolated incidents of violence and 33 arrests were reported on the third night of rioting. Hundreds of police officers descended onto the neighborhood to enforce the 7:00 pm curfew and curb violence. Fifty people had been injured, mostly police. Over 60 police vehicles had been either destroyed or damaged, along with 21 city transit buses. At least 31 businesses had been looted or damaged and losses to both city and private property totaled in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. |
| 1991 – Crown Heights riot, August 1991, Brooklyn, New York After the death of Gavin Cato, members of the black community believed that the decision to remove Lifsh from the scene first was racially motivated. About three hours after the riots began, early on the morning of August 20, a group of approximately 20 young black men surrounded 29-year-old Australian Jew, Yankel Rosenbaum, a University of Melbourne student in the United States conducting research for his doctorate. For three days following the accident, numerous African Americans and Caribbean Americans of the neighborhood, joined by growing numbers of non-residents, rioted in Crown Heights. In the rioting of the ensuing three days, according to Edward Shapiro, many of the rioters "did not even live in Crown Heights." During the riots, Jews were injured, stores were looted, and cars and homes were damaged. The rioters identified Jewish homes by the mezuzot affixed to the front doors. An additional 350 police officers were added to the regular duty roster on August 20 and were assigned to Crown Heights in an attempt to quell the rioting. After episodes of rock- and bottle-throwing involving hundreds of blacks and Jews, and after groups of blacks marched through Crown Heights chanting "No Justice, No Peace!", "Death to the Jews!", and "Whose streets? Our streets!", an additional 1,200 police officers were sent to confront rioters in Crown Heights. By the time the three days of rioting ended, 152 police officers and 38 civilians were injured, 27 vehicles were destroyed, seven stores were looted or burned, and 225 cases of robbery and burglary were committed. At least 129 arrests were made during the riots, including 122 blacks and seven whites. Property damage was estimated at one million dollars. |
| 1992 – L.A. Rodney King riots, April–May 1992, Los Angeles, California The unrest began in South Central Los Angeles on April 29, after a trial jury acquitted four officers of the Los Angeles Police Department for usage of excessive force in the arrest and beating of Rodney King, which had been videotaped and widely viewed in TV broadcasts. The rioting spread throughout the Los Angeles metropolitan area, as thousands of people rioted over a six-day period following the announcement of the verdict. Widespread looting, assault, arson, and murder occurred during the riots, and estimates of property damage were over $1 billion. |
| 1992 - West Last Vegas riots The West Las Vegas riots were sparked on April 29, 1992, after the Rodney King verdict, where all four white Los Angeles Police Department officers were acquitted for the beating of Rodney King in Los Angeles, California. After the Los Angeles riots were sparked, Black residents of West Las Vegas had already started to loot and burned several stores. Gun battles had started with snipers at intersections and one white motorist was pulled from his vehicle and beaten. The violence occurred just 7 miles away from the Las Vegas Strip. Las Vegas police officers placed buses under Interstate 15 to keep rioters from crossing out of West Las Vegas and into the downtown area. After the riots, $6 million in property was damaged and the tensions with the police lasted the next 18 days. |
| 1992 – 1992 Washington Heights riots, July 4–7, Manhattan, New York, Dominican community The Washington Heights riots occurred July 4–7, 1992 when protests over the fatal police shooting of Jose Garcia, a Dominican immigrant from Washington Heights, Manhattan, turned violent throughout a 40-square-block area of New York City. One man was killed after falling five stories off a building, 15 were injured and 11 were arrested. |
| 1994 – Eastside Lexington riots, October 26, 1994, Lexington, Kentucky After a police officer fatally shot a teen-ager in a predominantly black neighborhood, hundreds of blacks roamed the city's downtown today, damaging police cars and throwing rocks at whites. About 100 police officers in riot gear were quickly dispatched to keep the crowds away from government buildings. Several people, including at least one police officer, were injured, but none of the injuries were believed serious. The police said a handful of people had been treated at hospitals and released. By dark, most people had left the downtown area, but many people remained on the streets in black neighborhoods, some throwing objects at passing cars. |
| 1996 – St. Petersburg, Florida Riot 1996, October 1996, St. Petersburg, Florida During the investigation immediately following this event, a large crowd had gathered and became agitated due to the police department not sharing information and a number of witnesses describing events. The situation quickly got out of hand and the crowd began throwing rocks, bottles, and other items at police officers. At least 20 people were arrested and 28 arson fires were confirmed as groups of youths ran back and forth throughout the night, throwing rocks, bricks and bottles at officers in riot gear, businesses and passing cars. At least 11 people were injured, including a police officer who was shot and a newspaper photographer who was beaten, as hundreds of people swarmed through the streets after the shooting on October 24. Stores were looted and thick smoke clouded the neighborhood just south of downtown. |
