The parents of a 13-year-old boy in Mill Creek have filed a lawsuit against the city's police department over a crash that they say was no accident. According to the complaint, an officer intentionally used his patrol vehicle to cause a collision with the boy's small motorcycle. The legal action turns an encounter from last August into a civil dispute now headed for the courts.
The lawsuit lays out how the episode began. Police were notified that two children were riding minibikes near Mill Creek Town Center, with the kids reportedly riding both in the road and on the sidewalk. It was the kind of complaint officers field routinely, but the family says what followed went well beyond a normal response.
According to the lawsuit, a Mill Creek police officer spotted the two minibike riders and was then told not to pursue them. That instruction, the parents allege, was not followed. The complaint frames the officer's next move as a deliberate choice rather than a split-second reaction during a chase.
The central claim is about how the crash happened. The lawsuit states that the officer drove his patrol vehicle in front of one of the boys, causing him to crash. The parents describe the maneuver as intentional, arguing that the officer used the cruiser to bring the 13-year-old's minibike down rather than to safely stop him.
Beyond the collision itself, the suit raises a constitutional question. It alleges that the officer violated the boys' federal civil rights, asserting that the officer targeted the teenager because of his race. That claim moves the case from a dispute over a traffic encounter into the realm of civil-rights litigation against the department.
The Mill Creek Police Department had not responded to requests for comment on the allegations in the lawsuit. With the complaint now filed, the family's claims and any defense the city offers will be weighed through the legal process. For the parents, the filing is an effort to hold the department accountable for what they describe as a deliberate and dangerous act against their child.