A financial settlement has been reached between the city of Cleveland and the family of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, the child who was gunned down while playing with a toy gun in November of 2014. According to an order filed in U.S. District Court the parties agreed to rest the federal lawsuit for a total of $6 million. The terms of the settlement stipulate that the city acknowledges no responsibility in the boy's death.

The agreement brings an end to one of the more bitter legal cases in recent history. In January 2015 Rice's family sued for wrongful death, pointing out that 911 dispatchers failed to remind police responders of the caller's statement informing them that Rice's gun was likely a toy and charging that thus, officer Timothy Loehmann had approached the scene too aggressively and fired too quickly; also citing that the video showed that officers failed to lend a wounded Tamir any assistance as he lay dying. The city rebuked the family's charge of negligence, maintaining that Tamir was at fault and defending that the officers involved were entitled to immunity. Officials later apologized for their response.

The Rice killing came on the accumulation of Black civilian shootings by police, sparking massive protests and helping to further catapult the Black Lives Matter movement. Most recently Mothers of Police and Gun Violence have been invited to travel on Hillary Clinton's campaign trail, as the message of police violence against the Black community takes on an greater visibility. Some analysts have suggested that the settlement was sought in a manner that could best expedite closure of the process, with both parties willing to avoid a potentially long and tedious legal case.

Source: thedailybeast.com