Hundreds gather for trooper’s funeral
The deeds of evil men were not lost on the Rev. Jerry Jones as he addressed the hundreds of somber state police officers and civilians who sat before him Monday in a college basketball arena.
“We live in a hellish world,” Jones said, his tone calm but stern.
“You do and you see things that we don’t want to see,” Jones said, addressing the troopers present. “May God bless you, you men and women who wear the uniform.”
Those in attendance at the Lloyd Noble Center
gathered for the funeral of Lt. Donald Heath Meyer, an Oklahoma Highway Patrol trooper
killed earlier this month during a car chase.
Meanwhile, Cleveland County prosecutors last week charged the driver of a car involved in the chase with first-degree murder.
Meyer, 43, had set out stop sticks on Interstate 35 near N 27 in Moore during a July 14 chase when he was struck by another trooper’s cruiser.
The driver of the fleeing vehicle, D’Angelo Ladon Burgess, 28, was arrested the night of the accident. Burgess remained in the Cleveland County jail Monday afternoon, held on $5 million bail. He was charged Thursday with first-degree murder, eluding a police officer and possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia.
Jones and Meyer were both pastors at Anchor Church, 1200 Lakewood Drive, which Meyer and his wife started in their home almost a decade ago. Meyer joined the Oklahoma Highway Patrol in 2005, after graduating from Oklahoma Baptist University the year before. He was the 36th Oklahoma trooper to die in the line of duty.
“We ask our troopers to go out and do incredibly dangerous work. It’s volatile, and sometimes it’s violent,” Oklahoma Department of Safety Commissioner Michael Thompson said to those gathered.
Thompson is a tall, stoic man, but his deep voice wavered as he read to Meyer’s family a proclamation from Gov. Mary Fallin honoring the fallen trooper’s service to the state.
Thompson worked in the same building as Meyer, he recalled after the funeral, and Meyer was just as much a pastor at work as he was from behind the pulpit. He was quick to put others at ease with a warm smile and handshake.
Meyer’s father-inlaw was a trooper, and through that example he saw another opportunity to give, Thompson said.
“He just has a servant’s heart,” Thompson said. He added that Meyer volunteered to work in Troop A, which covers the metro area and is the biggest and busiest troop in the patrol.
Dozens of Oklahoma state troopers filed into the east entrance of the center Monday morning. The wives of several troopers dotted the line every five or six officers, their bright dresses standing in stark contrast with the tan trooper uniforms. State police from every state bordering Oklahoma, as well as some from as far away as Georgia and Illinois, filed in behind them in full dress.
At the time of the crash, Burgess was out on bail and facing charges connected to a similar incident the year before. Burgess was arrested in June 2016 after a pursuit that ended when he crashed a car. Meyer also worked that crash, Adams, the highway patrol chief, confirmed.
At the funeral, Adams told his fellow troopers he recognizes the dangers involved in situations they face every day.
“They’re uncertain, they’re ambiguous and they’re volatile,” Adams said. “Saying all that, we place you there to face down evil and restore order out of chaos.”