The brutal attack on 75-year-old Jeanette Marken outside the King County Courthouse in downtown Seattle on December 20, 2025, is a stark reminder of how far law enforcement has fallen when it comes to protecting citizens. Marken lost an eye after career criminal Fale Vaigalepa Pea, 42, swung a wooden board with a protruding screw, striking her with both hands in a vicious, unprovoked assault. Body camera footage, captured by KOMO News, shows officers immediately recognizing Pea, with one asking, “Is that Fale Pea?” Another replies, “Yeah, you know him? He’s notorious for random assaults on Third.” As EMTs loaded the bleeding Marken onto a stretcher, an officer casually remarked, “He’s a regular. He usually punches. I guess today he decided to escalate from his usual.”
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The image is haunting: on the left, Marken lies in a hospital bed, her face bandaged where her eye once was, a testament to the violence she endured. On the right, the body cam footage shows her crumpled on the wet pavement, surrounded by officers and medics, with Pea nowhere in sight—captured by the Seattle Police Real Time Crime Center.
This isn’t just a random act; it’s the predictable outcome of a system that’s failed. Pea’s rap sheet is a mile long: a 2011 SeaTac stabbing where he nearly killed someone with eight wounds, earning just 18 months of community custody; more assault charges in 2020, four in 2023, and one in 2024; eight bookings this year alone for assault, indecent exposure, drugs, property damage, weapons, and mischief—yet none stuck until now. He’s finally charged with first-degree assault, but the police’s blasé “he’s a regular” attitude is beyond disgusting. This isn’t woke policing; it’s negligence masquerading as compassion.
Seattle’s soft-on-crime policies—letting repeat offenders roam free—enabled this. Marken’s family is rightfully outraged, and the public should be too. The days of officers who care are long gone; now, they shrug at a predator who escalated from punches to blinding an elderly woman. Voters, demand accountability—lock up the Peas, not the protectors.
