Let's say Rodney King was able to get off one lucky punch (or pulled a gun after being batoned) that severely injured or even killed one of the LEOs. That would have changed the calculus of the situation, but all else being equal, one could argue its justification.
No, lets not forget he was a wanted criminal, a fleeing felon, and had charged at and been trying to attack officers before what appears to be excessive force was used.
The footage widely shown however is only of that end result. In fact the media continuously played that footage over and over building on the emotions of blacks for ratings. Eventualy that would erupt into the riots that are so infamous.
If a guy was a felony suspect that just led police on a pursuit, and then proceeded to attack police when they pulled him over and you were the officer being attacked by a heavily built man with a long history of prison time,high on PCP, and very strong...
You would probably want to be justified in shooting him.
They instead began to use thier nightsticks, he continued to try to resist, they continued to use them. Eventualy it crossed a line and became punishment for his actions based on officer emotions. However that is a grey area under the circumstances, and a jury aquited them all.
A better real life example would be the ruby ridge incident. Officer's acting on a "valid" warrant attempted to sneak onto someone's property and when confronted by armed property owner's in a rural location in the free state of Idaho (where being armed in your yard is perfectly acceptable) fired at the dog accompanying them and then aimed thier rifles at the individuals. The child on seeing his pet killed cried out and aimed his rifle at the officers who were clearly posing a threat to anyone on the property. The officers shot at him and hit him, I believe in the arm, injuring him.
The child then attempted to flee and while running away was shot at multiple times eventualy being shot in the back. The man with the child who was a family friend then opened fire on the officer killing him.
That was later deemed to be a justifiable shooting.
Of course there was multiple arguments in that ruling, one being that the officers did not identify themselves as U.S. Marshals.
However that was in Idaho and a very public case with local support.
I imagine a similar incident on either coast would have resulted in the man going away for life.
. But are there any circumstances that you could claim self defense against a LEO?
