As officers approached a home on Eden Park Drive, the mother shouted that her son was running. An officer chased a juvenile in a white shirt and backpack across Lake Washington Road. Officers took the teen to the ground and, when he resisted and complained his right arm hurt, secured him with two sets of handcuffs. Officers wrote that they believed he might be reaching for a weapon in his waistband.

Moments later, a bystander told officers a different juvenile had scaled a wall into a neighboring apartment complex. The teen the officers had detained was not the runaway. He was released from the handcuffs. His right elbow was swollen and, according to Fire Rescue, possibly dislocated. He was 15 years old and, the use-of-force report confirms, unarmed and not arrested.

The actual runaway was found nearby by another officer, placed under a Baker Act and taken to Circles of Care for evaluation.

The department’s use-of-force report classifies the outcome as “serious bodily injury.”

Ruled “within policy,” but flagged for review

Every supervisor in the review chain, from the on-scene sergeant up to the deputy chief, found the officers’ use of force to be within department policy.

Even so, Deputy Chief David Waltemeyer added a note to the file. While concurring with the finding, he wrote that supervisors would still review “the initial actions that developed the bases of the Baker Act decision, Ofc. Markle’s BWC violation and officers’ handcuffing technique that resulted in the injury.”

That single sentence is notable: it is the department, in its own records, connecting the boy’s injury to how officers handcuffed him and flagging that Markle again had a body-camera problem.

A pattern in Markle’s record

Markle was hired in January 2025 and was still on extended probation, set to run through July 30, 2026, when the June incident occurred, according to a personnel summary provided by the chief’s office.

His internal-affairs history, released as part of the same records request, shows a series of sustained findings in his roughly 18 months on the job:

• In June 2025, while still a police academy cadet, Markle received a sustained written reprimand after a former partner filed a complaint alleging Markle repeatedly contacted him after their breakup, showed up at his gym, and knocked on his apartment door while covering the peephole.
• In February and March 2026, Markle received counseling for efficiency and report-writing problems, including a case where delayed paperwork on a DUI and methamphetamine-trafficking arrest held up the State Attorney’s Office.
• In May 2026, an investigation into a complaint by a Planet Fitness member sustained three policy violations against Markle. Investigators found he had trespassed the man, a cancer patient resting in his van, by misapplying the city’s public-camping ordinance, which does not apply to private property, and that he had failed to turn on his body-worn camera for the entire call.

The June incident marked at least the third time body-camera use was raised as an issue in Markle’s file.

The other officer

A second responding officer, Thomas Alabise, has his own disciplinary record in the released files. Hired in 2022, Alabise received a corrective counseling in October 2025 and a written reprimand in April 2026 for two separate at-fault vehicle crashes, the second while responding to a fleeing suspect. He was also counseled over overtime-bidding procedure violations. Alabise’s probation is listed as completed.

Still unanswered

The records do not state why Markle resigned or whether it was connected to the June 24 incident or the supervisory review the deputy chief ordered. It is also unclear what came of that review, or the current condition of the injured teen.

Body-worn and in-car camera footage and photographs of the boy’s injuries are referenced in the file as existing evidence.