The Nation - News from March 4, 1987

One of two laid-off auto workers who allegedly beat a Chinese-American man to death in Detroit because they thought he was Japanese has agreed to pay $65,600 to the victim’s estate. The settlement calling for Michael Nitz, 28, to pay Vincent Chin’s estate was reached as attorneys were about to argue a $30-million wrongful death lawsuit against Nitz and his stepfather, Robert Ebens, 47. Ebens and Nitz were accused of beating Chin with a baseball bat on June 19, 1982. Chin died four days later. Witnesses said the men directed racial slurs at Chin, 27, apparently thinking he was Japanese, and chided him about U.S. auto industry layoffs.