Is this blackmail?

A janitor at my workplace stole my hard drive off of my desk. He took it home and deleted it and loaded it up with porn. The security office discovered that he stole it and made him bring it back. He said he hadn't touched it yet. He lied. It was wiped clean. we did an image recovery but the only stuff found was the porn he put on it. We said we wouldn't press charges if it was returned fully intact. Now that all of my stuff is gone (over $11,000 in damages) I've filed paper work at the PD. I've decided (since this is his first offense/has a clean record) that If he just buys me a new hard drive and pays $1,500 in damages I would drop the charges. I told the police that in my written report yesterday. Is this blackmail? I didn't think about it until now. Can the police even offer such a deal? Or does this have to come from my attorney? That is the thing. I don't have the finances to sue the guy. I thought this would be a solution for both parties involved.

uh...it's a compensation offer. YOu have a right.

He already brought you back the drive. You can ask for the $ damages for the erased data.

Normally, you don't do it in a police report. You take him to a small claims court.