Amadou Diallo was young West African man killed by a rainstorm of police bullets in 1999. His case was major news. Bruce Springsteen wrote a song about him, "American Skin (41 shots)" that angered New York's finest at the time. The cops who shot Diallo were tried and acquitted in 2000.

Today, New York City agreed to pay his family $3 million .

We like to see big awards for police misconduct. Abner Louima, the Haitian man tortured with a broomstick in a New York police precinct bathroom got $8.75 million.

Diallo and Louima have the same great lawyers:

Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld founded and direct the Innocence Project, which currently represents more than two hundred inmates seeking post-conviction release through DNA testing.

Perhaps the most prominent civil rights lawyers in America, Scheck and Neufeld represent the family of Amadou Diallo, Abner Louima, and the four black and latino youths wrongfully shot by NY State Troopers.