CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department Officer Joshua Eyer was honored Friday with a procession and memorial in downtown Charlotte.
"What a beautiful experience it has been to see this community come together in support of the ones who chose every day to protect us, even though most of us don't deserve it," Charlie Sardelli, Eyer's best friend of 15 years, said during the slain officer's memorial service.
Eyer — a husband and father to a one-year-old son — was one of four officers killed in the line of duty in east Charlotte on Monday while serving a warrant for a felon in possession of a firearm at a residence on Galway Drive.
The other three officers have been identified as Deputy U.S. Marshal Thomas M. Weeks Jr.; North Carolina Department of Adult Correction (NCDAC) Officers Sam Poloche and William "Alden" Elliott, who were members of a USMS fugitive task force. Another four officers were injured by gunfire.
"When he spoke to you, all he did was listen. . . . And if you needed the shirt from his back, he would have it off his body before you were done asking [the] question," Sardelli said. "When I was 20, my family lost our home, and I was with Josh when I got that phone call that my mom was on the street with my dog and a shopping cart full of her stuff. Josh didn't just drop me off. He stayed. He spent eight to ten hours making sure my family's things were taken care of."
Eyer then drove Sardelli's mother to New York at 11 p.m. "But that's just who Josh was," Sardelli said before thanking Eyer's parents for raising a good man and thanking Eyer's wife, Ashley Eyer, for raising their toddler son.
Sardelli remembered how Eyer would often check in on him, sending a text that read, "How's things?" and told memorial attendees to do the same for their loved ones.
"As one who received them so regularly, they'll mean more than you can ever imagine to the person on the other side," Sardelli said.
Ashley Eyer remembered her husband as her "very best friend."
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"He was so, so good to me. I never have and never will question how much he loved me, and I will carry his love for me for the rest of my life. He loved all of you, too," she said, adding later that the best way to honor and maintain her husband's legacy would be to help her teach her son "who his daddy was and what he meant to each of you."
"Joshua, thank you for giving me a beautiful life and our beautiful son. We won't let you down, OK?" she said.
Hundreds of other officers took part in Friday's possession and hundreds of onlookers watched.
Memorial services for the three other slain officers have yet to be announced.
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CMPD Chief Johnny Jennings during a Tuesday press conference said more than 100 rounds were fired between the suspect or suspects inside the house and responding officers on Monday. Investigators recovered an AR-15 and a .40-caliber handgun from the scene.
Suspect Terry Clark Hughes Jr., 39, died at the scene Monday after firing at officers from the second floor of his Galway Drive home, on the front and back side, Jennings said. Two additional persons of interest – both female, one only 17 years old – were taken into custody. Authorities have yet to determine whether there are any additional suspects who can be charged in connection with the mass shooting.
Hughes had an "extensive" criminal record in multiple counties and had spent a significant amount of time in jail, according to North Carolina public records and Chief Jennings.
It is unclear at this time whether any other shooters were involved or if any other charges will be announced.
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President Biden visited Charlotte on Thursday to meet the fallen officers' families and members of CMPD.
"We must do more to protect our law enforcement officers," the president said in a Monday statement. "That means funding them – so they have the resources they need to do their jobs and keep us safe. And it means taking additional action to combat the scourge of gun violence. Now. Leaders in Congress need to step up so that we ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, require safe storage of guns and pass universal background checks and a national red flag law. Enough is enough."
