The city of Aurora has reached a $1.9 million settlement with a black Colorado family after police held four juvenile family members at gunpoint. Brittney Gilliam and her six-year-old daughter, nieces aged 14 and 17, and sister aged 12 were wrongly stopped in a parking lot in 2020. Police ordered the girls to lie face down in the hot parking lot and be handcuffed. The incident was caught on camera and caused outrage at the time.
Police had wrongly assumed Ms Gilliam was driving a stolen car and had been trained to carry out a “high-risk stop”. BBC reported. They apologized for the incident and offered to reimburse therapy services for the children.
Ms Gilliam later sued the officers, accusing them of “profound and systemic” racism, the media reported.
Aurora police handcuffed and held family at gunpoint. pic.twitter.com/GkTWKFZqkI
— Joshua Rodriguez (@Joshuajered) August 3, 2020
On the day of the incident, Brittney Gilliam and the girls went to a nail salon and returned to their car after discovering the salon was closed. Officers then approached the vehicles with weapons drawn as the family got into the car.
In the video, Ms. Gilliam and all four girls lie face down in the parking lot. Ms Gilliam, her 12-year-old sister and her 17-year-old niece were handcuffed.
The children can be heard crying and calling for the mother as witnesses question police about the situation.
“Would your kids be okay after that? If a gun was pulled on them and they were on the ground. Especially if they were a six-year-old,” Ms. Gilliam told CBS shortly afterwards.
Police say the car's license plate number matches the number of a stolen vehicle, but from another state.
Officers immediately released everyone involved when they realized their mistake, according to Aurora's police chief, Vanessa Wilson.
On Monday, David Lane, attorney for the family, confirmed that a settlement had been reached with the city of Aurora.
“All parties are very satisfied with this settlement,” he said in a statement.
A spokesperson for the Aurora Police Department said Tuesday that the agency “remains committed to strengthening its relationship with the community through accountability and continually improving how it serves the public.”
“We have been trying to train Aurora for several years so that police spend less time at the shooting range and more time in the law library,” Lane said. The Washington Post.