"Rooftop Korean" Tony Moon, who helped protect his Los Angeles community during the 1992 riots, speaks out amid the 2025 LA riots. He tells Glenn Beck why today's riots are very different than those in 1992: "they're NOT organic."
Transcript
Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors
GLENN: From 1992, I believe this is the NBC report on the '92 riots in LA.
Listen.
VOICE: March 16th, 1991, Latasha Harlans, a black teenager is shot and killed by a Korean store owner.
Sun Ja Do (phonetic). Do is convicted of voluntary manslaughter, but is sentenced only to parole and a small fine.
The black community is outraged and remembers.
VOICE: Six months probation?
I mean, the people were pissed then.
VOICE: Today, local Korean radio is broadcasting which stores in the area are threatened.
Young men like Eddie Kim rush over to try to defend them.
VOICE: I don't care about anything.
But it's not a riot. Okay?
You know, it's not a riot.
VOICE: He spent last night, and will spend tonight, guarding his appliance store.
A small battalion of employees and relatives will try to help.
VOICE: I only have one shotgun.
That's all I have.
What do they have?
They have hundreds of people. Hundreds of young people.
With lots of guns!
VOICE: After the destruction, many Koreans have lost all faith that the authorities can protect them.
GLENN: We have one of those Koreans that were protecting people.
Tony Moon, a rooftop Korean from 1992. Welcome, Tony, how are you?
TONY: I'm doing well, Glenn. Thank you for having me on the show. It's a pleasure.
GLENN: I've got to tell you what an honor it is to you have you on.
Can you take us through the experience that you had in the '92 LA riots?
TONY: Of course.
I was 19 at the time. And I was fairly similar -- a little familiar with Latasha's verdict.
But being 19, I wasn't really plugged into politics. Or current events.
Then when things blew up, after the Rodney King verdict, I came down on a Wednesday.
It's when we saw the outrage from the black community. And that's what it was in '92. It was basically the community, that had legitimate reasons to be upset.
And there was a rift between the black community and the Korean community, because the Korean community actually went into the black areas that were predominantly black, and open businesses there. And were doing businesses in the community.
Because of the cultural differences between the two. There was a lot of, I guess you can say, a lot of built-up animosity towards each other. And that's where I guess that's -- the riots, a lot of the pent up frustration was targeting Korean business owners because of that.
And it went on from Wednesday, until through the weekend. Until the National Guard showed up.
But we were fending for ourselves by Thursday.
And the call went out on Thursday. And it went out, when many of us answered the call. A lot of the misconception, is that it was just Korean shop owners. Which wasn't true.
There were a lot of young men like myself. Nineteen, 20. 22-year-olds that went out there.
That's kind of what I'm writing in my book right now.
From that perspective.
Growing up in Los Angeles, at that time.
And what the culture was like. And who some of these young men were.
One of them being Eddie Lee. Who gave his life that week.
You know, for the community.
And unfortunately, it was -- you know, through friendly fire. And I detailed that in my book. Regarding why that happened.
And who some of these young men were, like myself. And my driver, who was out there.
And we weren't always, always. You know, we weren't all on the roof.
Which is -- it's a misconception.
Some of us were out there. Literally --
GLENN: What do you mean, by we were hunting?
JASON: You know, they think -- a lot of people think we're just shooting at looters, which is not the case.
In '90s, LA it was a very gang-rich culture in the '90s. I mean, there were a lot of gangs. One of the large gangs that came out of LA.
And which is -- which is, a Salvadorian gang, that started in the mid-'80s.
And a lot of them, were shooting at these business owners. And some of us who had a background in the streets. Knew -- knew their territory. And knew who they were.
So we actually went into some of these areas. To basically let them.
Put them on notice.
That it's not just the older generation that is shooting at them.
But we actually will be actively hunting them down too. And LA is very layered and complicated. There's a lot of pockets and neighborhoods, where they have different ethnic groups.
And the rule is that, you don't go into other people's area, and mess around.
GLENN: Yeah.
TONY: And you stay in your own neighborhood. You be respectful of other people's different neighborhoods. You don't go there. And just start popping off shots. And that's kind of what they were doing. And it worked out, in the end. It worked out.
GLENN: No. I know. I lived in New Haven, Connecticut. That has a very rich Italian history. And that was what the way it was. You know, the it's not protected their neighborhood. And don't come into the Italian neighborhood and try to stir anything up, or you'll be in trouble with the Italians. And they won't mess with you and your neighborhood. Just everybody take care of yourself.
TONY: Exactly.
GLENN: So did you ever feel like a vigilante in any way? Did you feel that maybe this was questionable to take this on yourself?
TONY: No. Not at all.
When you -- you don't have law enforcement out in the streets anymore.
You know, the streets become a lot -- it's everybody for themselves. You become -- you kind of gain kind of a tribal sense of protecting your own.
Right?
So it's no longer a sense of vigilantism. Just protecting your own. And making sure there's any encroachment into your territory.
So I didn't see it as being a vigilante.
But just maintaining law and order.
Somewhat law and order, some semblance of peace.
And that was done through the barrel of -- you know, a firearm.
GLENN: Compare what you went through, you know, the Rodney King riots.
The George Floyd riots.
And this riot. Is there any difference?
TONY: Absolutely. Absolutely. The 1992 riots were organic. You had different parts of L.A. County that were upset. And you had fires and looting. Because the black community was spread out through south LA, Compton, south-central -- La Habra Heights.
Different areas. And you could actually see that. You know, when you are -- looked at the city, as a whole. From let's say Hollywood. You saw the fires from different parts of the city.
This -- these riots that are occurring now, with like the 2020, what I call the BLM riots. Now the 2025 LA riots are happening now.
They are very centralized. And they're not organic. They're being funded by NGOs. And it's a leftist Marxist agenda, that's being pushed to make it seem as if there's widespread support for this.
For example, the criminal rights that are occurring right now. It's just happening in downtown LA.
And the curfew that was by the mayor is only -- I don't know it off the top of my head. Two square mile radius. Right? One square mile.
Yeah. That's what it is.
Anyone outside that one square mile. Life always proceeds as it has been.
It doesn't look like there's anything going on. Where the difference in 1992, whether you were in Hollywood, Culver City, which is further out west.
And then Hollywood is up north, past downtown LA. August, you stop at downtown LA. You had fires. Looting. I mean, it was widespread.
This isn't anything like what's going on down to 1992.
And it just kind of shows the incompetence of the current leadership of not being able to get their arms around something like this.
Because of their lack of leadership.
And I would say common sense. They're letting these protesters spiral out of control.
Because many of them, the playbook is for them to start in downtown LA at City Hall.
Then make their way down, which really pisses off a lot of people. Because, you know, it's -- it's a highly traveled freeway in LA.
GLENN: I know. It's a parking lot.
You stop me from getting home, I don't care -- I don't care if you're for free candy bars. Reindeer and Santa. I hate your guts if you delay me on that how. I hate you when I'm driving home.
TONY: Absolutely. Absolutely. So there's no widespread recourse for this.
GLENN: Okay. So tell me about how the feeling -- what the feeling is on Trump and the National Guard coming in.
TONY: I think it's awesome.
I think this should have been done back in 2020. But obviously, you know, during that time. It was the administration.
First time going through this.
I posted it recently on Twitter. That, you know, when you take a shot at a man, and you try to assassinate him. He comes back different.
You know, and that's what he's shown.
GLENN: Yeah. Yeah. It is. It is.
Newsom and Bass both say, the riots are contained. Didn't need the National Guard.
This is Trump just trying to turn into a dictator. This is their communities having enough of the people being disappeared on the streets.
What do you say?
What is the average person that you talk to say about those kinds of things?
JASON: I would trust the meteorologist more than I would trust Newsom or Bass.
They -- they're in the same basket as Pelosi. They lie about what's going on. Because of social media. And because of, you know, the lack of reporting, from the local news.
Which covers for the current leadership in L.A. County.
Including the mayor and the board of supervisors. The people that are not getting 100 percent of the news.
And this is no different than what happened in early -- earlier this year with the fires. With what was going on in palisades. Altadena.
You know, the news, in order to get coverage for the local leadership. And to get on their good side, they're not going to report anything bad that's happening.
Currently, I believe there's a class-action lawsuit, gets an board of supervisors. The mayor. I think there are tons of lawsuits being filed right now.
And the problem is that it's not these individuals that will be detained for this.
It's the city and the county.
It will be a drain on the budget. And it will affect the social services, like paramedics, firefighters, you know, law enforcement.
GLENN: I can't imagine being those guys.
TONY: Yeah.
GLENN: Let me ask you for any advice you would give to mom and pop business owners that are vulnerable today?
TONY: A lot of them are downtown LA. I would say, board up. What I've noticed, 1992, the shops that were spared were the ones that had steel roll-up doors. Those do well.
Otherwise, lock your doors.
GLENN: Yeah.
TONY: And deterrence is really a great way to keep looters out. So you don't have to necessarily take shots at them. But displaying, I outlined it in my Twitter feed. I pinned it to my profile.
Deterrence is actually really great.
Because these individuals are looking for low-hanging fruit. So they're looking for an opportunity. So they want to go for the easiest shop or whatever they're going to loot.
So if they move -- you know, you have a shotgun or, you know, an AR. Right?
And they see you're armed. They will think twice before answering. And they will move on to the next target.
GLENN: By the way, you can follow Tony Moon @RoofKorean7. That's his Twitter handle.
RoofKorean7. When does your book come out? You have to send me a copy so I can read it in advance, because I want to have you back when it's out.
TONY: Absolutely. Absolutely. You've been most gracious to me.
I don't know if you know, but I did an interview with Morgan from three years ago in your studio, which turned into a museum, I think. You have some really great artifacts in there.
GLENN: I do, thank you. Yeah, thank you. I didn't know that.
TONY: Yeah.
I'm trying to release it. Well, I'm finishing it up by the end of -- near the end of this month.
My kids are going to read it. Because the book is tailored towards the next generation like Gen Alpha. Gen Z.
GLENN: Yeah, yeah.
TONY: Because these kids weren't alive during that time.
And they only see what online social media is portraying. And also, you know, what they may hear from the news. So I want to give them an account from being -- from a teenage perspective at 19, in terms of what it looked like, and how it played out. So my kids are read the first half.
Some of them are in my book. They will read it too, and once they give their blessing and they're okay with it, I will try to push it out before the end of the summer.
GLENN: That's great. Well, do me a favor. As soon as you're comfortable, send a copy to me so I can read it.
Because I would love to be ahead on it.
But, Tony, best of luck. Thanks for coming on with me, I really appreciate it.
JASON: Thank you, Glenn. Thank you for this time. I really appreciate it.
GLENN: You bet. Tony Moon. 1992. Rooftop Korean on the LA riots, then and now.
