MINNEAPOLIS — The attorney for the family of a man fatally shot by Minneapolis police says they have settled a lawsuit with the city involving unlawful detention of his children.
May Jung Law announced Friday that survivors of Chiasher Vue, killed during an encounter with MPD officers on Dec. 15, 2019, will receive $700,000 for what unfolded during the incident.
Police were dispatched to a home on the 3100 block of Thomas Ave. N that evening on reports of a domestic issue. Responding officers said the 52-year-old Vue, a Hmong immigrant, came out of the house carrying a weapon and fired on them. Nine law enforcement officers on the scene returned fire, killing Vue.
The Hennepin County Attorney's Office declined to file charges against any of the officers, saying the shooting was "necessary, proportional, and objectively reasonable."
The lawsuit filed in the wake of Vue's death alleged that officers detained Vue's four children for over five hours in the back of locked and unheated patrol cars, forcing them to hear radio traffic authorizing the use of deadly force against their father and ultimately, the barrage of bullets that killed him.
Video recordings from MPD squads reportedly capture over dozens of screams and cries to be released, and officers denying their requests.
Attorneys for the Vues say the children were then transported to MPD headquarters and locked in separate interrogation rooms — all against their will and without a legal basis. The children were allegedly held for five additional hours in interrogation rooms and were never told that their father had been killed hours earlier.
"We hope that the MPD and other law enforcement agencies throughout the country understand that upholding fundamental constitutional requirements is neither discretionary, optional, nor contingent upon an individual’s race, ethnicity, or language capabilities,” said Je Yon Jung, partner at May Jung Law, in a released statement. “It is our fervent hope that the policy changes implemented by the MPD will endure as more than temporary measures or mere lip service.”
May Jung Law maintains that the $700,000 settlement marks the largest witness unlawful detention case in the State of Minnesota, if not the country.
The settlement comes in the wake of changes in MPD policy regarding witness detention made in November of 2022.
A spokesman for the city of Minneapolis confirmed that the City Council voted to settle the lawsuit on March 9 but declined further comment.
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