The family of Derek Williams, who died after begging for help and gasping for breath in the back of a Milwaukee police squad car, will receive a $2 million settlement in a long-running civil rights suit against the city, attorneys said Tuesday.

The settlement comes eight years after Williams’ death in July 2011. It took three years for the two sides to agree on a resolution to the case, which was filed in 2016.

The money will be paid over time to Williams’ three children, now 8, 9 and 10. The children and their mother still celebrate his birthday and regularly visit his grave, said Milwaukee attorney Jon Safran, whose firm represented Williams' family along with the People's Law Office of Chicago.

"This settlement provides educational benefits, as well as compensating them to some degree and helping them know that at least there’s some justice," Safran said. "At least Derek's children will have some financial benefits, even though they’ll be dealing with the death of their father for the rest of their lives."

Assistant City Attorney Sue Lappen did not respond to a voicemail Tuesday.

Common Council President Ashanti Hamilton called the settlement a step in the right direction.

"Going to trial would not help the family nor the residents of the city of Milwaukee heal behind that incident," he said. "And I think this is the appropriate approach to dealing with what happened, and we’re hoping that changes are made so that these incidents don’t happen again.”

Also Tuesday, the Common Council approved a $2.3 million settlement in the 2010 death of James Franklin Perry in police custody.

Perry, 41, told Milwaukee police when he was arrested that he had not had his nightly anti-seizure medication. Eighteen hours later, he died of an epileptic seizure at the Milwaukee County Jail.

The civil suit was filed in 2012 and the settlement was reached in March. In addition to the money from the city, Perry's family will receive nearly $1 million from Milwaukee County, an attorney told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel earlier this year.

Video galvanized public opinion

The Williams case drew national attention, and squad car video showing Williams, 22, struggling to breathe galvanized public opinion and prompted protests in Milwaukee. In the intervening years, video has played a key role in the public's response to police shootings and police-custody deaths across the country.

The initial investigations into Williams' death — by Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm, the Milwaukee Police Department and the city's Fire and Police Commission — all cleared officers of wrongdoing.

Chisholm reopened the case, named a special prosecutor and sought an inquest after a Journal Sentinel investigation prompted the medical examiner's office to change its ruling in the death from natural to homicide. In forensic terms, homicide means "death at the hands of another" but does not necessarily mean a crime was committed.

The inquest jury recommended misdemeanor charges of failure to render aid by law enforcement against three officers: Richard Ticcioni, Jeffrey Cline and Jason Bleichwehl. Special Prosecutor John Franke did not charge them, saying he did not think he could prove a case. No officers were disciplined by the Police Department as a result of Williams’ death.

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One officer promoted

Ticcioni, who put his knee across Williams' back during the arrest, has since been promoted to detective.

Bleichwehl left the department in 2016. The city denied his request for duty disability retirement due to stress incurred as a result of Williams’ death and its aftermath.

The city twice appealed decisions by U.S. District Judge J.P. Stadtmueller as the case progressed. The second appeal was pending when the settlement was reached.

In those appeals, attorneys for the city argued that the officers were entitled to qualified immunity, a legal standard that says police officers can't be sued civilly unless they have violated a clearly established constitutional right.

Stadtmueller had ruled they were not entitled to that immunity.

"The officer defendants' conduct was so egregious that they could never have reasonably concluded that deliberately ignoring Williams' medical needs was consistent with his Fourth Amendment right," the judge wrote.

Tab for police misconduct: $23 million

The settlement in the Williams case brings the total amount paid by taxpayers as a result of police misconduct to $23 million since 2015, according to a Journal Sentinel analysis.

Ben Elson of the People's Law Office noted that Williams' death occurred around the same time as a series of illegal body cavity searches by Milwaukee police and involved some of the same officers. At the time, Edward Flynn was chief and his policing strategy included saturation patrols in largely African American neighborhoods, Elson said.

"In hindsight, that has turned out to be an incredible expense for the taxpayers," he said. "It's a tremendous toll that police misconduct has taken on the City of Milwaukee, and it will continue to be a tremendous taxpayer expense until these things change."

Alison Dirr of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.

Contact Gina Barton at (414) 224-2125 or gbarton@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter at @writerbarton.