The Mexican parents of a 35-year-old orchard worker, who was killed by police in Pasco, Washington in 2014, have filed a federal lawsuit accusing the officers of using excessive force.

As The Associated Press reports, Agapita Montes Rivera and Jesus Zambrano Fernandez filed the lawsuit on Jan. 6 in the U.S. District Court for Eastern Washington.

The defendants in the suit include Pasco Police Chief Robert Metzger and the three officers who shot at Antonio Zambrano Montes: Officers Adam Wright, Ryan Flanagan and Adrian Alaniz.

Zambrano Montes was shot by police multiple times, after he threw rocks at the authorities at a downtown intersection. Footage of the Feb. 10, 2015 shooting, which was recorded on a cellphone, went viral and led to weeks of protests.

As NBC News, Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney Shawn Sant announced that an investigation into the death led to no basis to criminally charge the officers.

"I think if anyone of you had a five-pound rock thrown at you, I think most people would determine that that rock is a deadly weapon in how that was used in that case," Sant said.

The authorities maintained that the rocks being hurled at the officers could have caused severe injuries to them or to others. They first used a Taser on Zambrano Montes, but the device did not deter him. According to an autopsy, Zambrano Montes had amphetamines in his system at the time of his death.

Charles Herrmann, the Seattle-based attorney who filed the federal lawsuit, said the evidence for excessive force in the case was profound.

“It’s obvious that 17 shots, resulting in 7-8 bullet wounds in a man who was first fleeing and then attempting to surrender, was excessive in the extreme,” Herrmann said.

The attorney faulted the city, as well as its police chief, for not training officers to de-escalate conflict when dealing with people who are mentally disturbed.

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