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Cleveland Agrees to Pay Tamir Rice's Family $6 Million Over Fatal Police Shooting

As part of the deal, the city made no admission of wrongdoing in the 12-year-old black boy's fatal shooting by a white police officer in November 2014.
Photo by David Maxwell

The city of Cleveland has agreed to pay the family of Tamir Rice $6 million to settle a lawsuit over the 12-year-old black boy's fatal shooting in 2014 by a white policeman, according to documents filed on Monday in federal court.

US District Judge Dan Aaron Polster, who mediated the settlement, said in the document filed in the Cleveland court that the city made no admission of wrongdoing in the shooting. The agreement must be approved by a probate judge.

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Rice was gunned down in November 2014 at a park near his house while he played with an Airsoft replica pistol. The two police officers involved in the incident — Frank Garmback and Timothy Loehmann — did not face criminal charges for shooting Rice. The officers were responding to a 911 call about a man carrying a gun, and Loehmann shot Rice within seconds of arriving on the scene.

Related: Cleveland Just Demanded Tamir Rice's Family Pay $500 for His Ambulance Bills

The incident was one of several — including the killings of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Freddie Gray in Baltimore, and Eric Garner in New York City — that triggered large protests and led to increased scrutiny of police killings, particularly in cases involving unarmed black men.

Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty, who was heavily criticized for failing to indict Loehmann and Garmback, lost his bid for re-election in March. McGinty was criticized during the probe of the shooting for the release of multiple reports that deemed the shooting "reasonable" before the grand jury decision.

After the Rice killing, a US Justice Department investigation found widespread excessive use of force by Cleveland police. The next day, the Rice family filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city and officers involved.

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