Western Wisconsin towns mourn 2 police officers shot over the weekend

Apr 11, 20230

Aaron Lavinsky, Star Tribune count

Chetek Police Chief Ron Ambrozaitis paid his respects at a memorial for two slain police officers, including one from his department, outside the Chetek Police Department on Monday evening in Barron County, Wis. Rural Wisconsin is reeling after two police officers were killed during a traffic stop.

BARRON, Wis. - They lined the main highway, kids with bikes next to Vietnam veterans with American flags, hundreds of people performing one of the most solemn rituals a town can perform: welcoming back the bodies of two slain police officers.

Then, 95 law enforcement vehicles drove in, lights flashing but sirens off, the crowd hushed. Two flag-draped coffins were wheeled into a local funeral home, officers from all over the state forming a phalanx of grief around them.

As law enforcement in western Wisconsin honored two police officers killed over the weekend, the close-knit small towns where the officers worked reacted with a combination of sadness and disbelief that something so tragic happened here.

https://www.startribune.com/loved-ones-mourn-deaths-of-2-western-wisconsin-police-officers-shot-over-the-weekend/600265902/