Police officers arrive at a funeral service for slain Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) police officer Brent Thompson on Wednesday.
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In Baton Rouge, Sterling’s 15-year-old son, Cameron Sterling, urged people to refrain from violence as they demand reforms in the US criminal justice system.
After the service, officers saluted as his casket was taken to a burial site in Coriscana, Texas.
Thompson’s service, held at The Potter’s House, a Dallas megachurch, was led by celebrity Bishop T.D. Jakes, who also sounded a resurrectionist theme.
Thompson’s widow Emily, at a service filled with hundreds of police officers in their dress blues, sent a pointed message to the shooter: “You know your hate made us stronger”.
The shootings in Louisiana and Minnesota were the latest in a series of high-profile police killings of black men in various U.S. cities that have brought intense scrutiny of police use of force, particularly against black suspects.
The demonstrators were protesting recent deaths by police. Nine officers and two civilians were injured in the attack.
Smith was known by family, friends and fellow officers for being upbeat and showing compassion toward others.
He served as an Army ranger before becoming a Dallas officer. Lorne Ahrens have told law enforcement officers from as far away as Canada that Ahrens was a “supersized can of kickass” who was a voracious reader with an intelligence that was equal to his size. After joining the Dallas police force in 1989, he received a “Cops’ Cop” award from the Dallas Police Association for his service.
Owen was sharing the faith of the man who was slain Thursday along with four other police officers in Dallas in a shooting rampage during a peaceful protest. In Minneapolis, a mixed-race group of several dozen protesters briefly closed the southbound lanes of a major highway, linking arms and chanting “Black Lives Matter”.
A funeral for Dallas police Officer Patrick Zamarripa will be held on Saturday.
A decal shows a Dallas Police Department badge with a black stripe across it on the side of a Restland Funeral Home hearse carrying the body of slain DPD Sgt. Michael Smith to Mary Immaculate Catholic Church Tuesday, July 12, 2016 in Farmers Branch, Texas.
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Dallas police officer Eddie Coffey described Ahrens as a calming presence and a down-to-earth man.
