PROCESS WATCH : Speedy Action

Acting more quickly than expected, the U.S. Justice Department has aggressively pursued a civil rights investigation of the four Los Angeles Police Department officers who were acquitted on most of the state charges stemming from the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney G. King.

As a result of that investigation, the officers face federal criminal charges under a post-Civil War statute that prohibits misusing authority to deprive a person of constitutional rights.

The Justice Department rarely prosecutes police officers, sheriff’s deputies or prison guards who have been accused of using unreasonable force in arrests or of brutalizing inmates. These cases are hard to win because jurors tend to believe the officers over criminal suspects or convicts.

In the last decade, the department has prosecuted about 25 of these cases, including some in which race did not figure--such as white officers accused of using excessive force on white suspects or prisoners.

Federal prosecutions are rare after officers have been acquitted on state charges stemming from the same conduct. But federal prosecutors can proceed without violating the constitutional protection against double jeopardy because the U.S. Supreme Court has held that the federal and state governments are separate authorities.

Whatever the outcome of the prosecution of the four LAPD officers, the timely federal indictments perhaps will help to hasten the end of an ugly chapter in Los Angeles history.