EASTMAN, Ga. (AP) – Hundreds of people – including law officers from around Georgia and the nation – mourned a slain Georgia police officer whose funeral was moved to a high school gymnasium to accommodate the huge crowd.
The Telegraph reports (http://bit.ly/2brbYBD) that nearly every seat was filled in Dodge County High School’s gym for Thursday afternoon’s funeral of Eastman Patrol Officer Timothy Smith.
His cousin, Chris Rogers, told mourners that Smith knew he wanted to be a police officer from the time he was a child growing up on a farm in Bacon County.
Authorities say Smith was responding to a call of a suspicious person with a gun when he was shot Saturday in Eastman, about 60 miles southeast of Macon.
Authorities later apprehended 24-year-old Royheem Deeds and charged him with murder.