The man who became famous in 1991, when a videotape recording showed him being beaten by LAPD police, Rodney King, was found dead this morning.

47-year-old Rodney King was found at the bottom of his Rialto home’s pool early this morning by his fiancee, the call was recieved by Rialto police about 5:25 am this morning.

Rialto police responded to the scene, pulled him from the pool, and began CPR . When fire department paramedics arrived, they transported him to the Arrowhead Regional Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 6:11 am.

According to reports, King’s fiancee heard him in the back yard this monring, and when she went out, she found him in the pool and called 911.

It was King’s beating and the acquittal of the four officers that were taped beating him that sparked the immense riots that swept Los Angeles in 1991.

King was 25 and on parole at the time of the beating. He had been out drinking and was headed home from a friend’s house when he saw a police car following him and he attempted to flee because he thought he may be sent back to prison.

When King was caught up to by the police, they struck him over 50 times and used a stun gun on him, while telling him, “We are going to kill you, n***er,” the officers later denied making those statements.

It was an amateur cameraman that captured the beating with nightsticks as police were gathered around King. King was almost beaten to death by the officers and required five hours of surgery after the attack.

The four officers indicted for the beating, Theodore Briseno, Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind and Sgt. Stacey Koon, were acquitted of charges of assaulkt with a deadly weapon and excessive use of force after a three-month trial.

In the riots that followed LA businesses were looted and buildings burned as outrage with the trial’s outcome was released. The rioting caused $1 billion in damage and cost the lives of 50 people.

A later federal trial would find Koon and Powell guilty, Brisano and Wind were again acquitted.

King later sued the city of Los Angeles and won a $3.8 million award.