3 fatherless boys express what words could not
The motorcade escorting the two bodies of slain Miami-Dade officers Amanda Haworth and Roger Castillo heads northbound on Interstate 95 after departing from American Airline Arena.
Three children walked on stage to speak of their slain father, their Papi, they called him. As they stood together, arms interlocked, overwhelmed by grief, the violence and gunplay afflicting a community's forsaken reaches were distilled to a tearful essence.
The memorial service for Miami-Dade police officers Roger Castillo and Amanda Haworth unfolded with the sadly familiar trappings of a police funeral. A long motor procession of patrol cars and roaring motorcycles. Blue lights against a dreary sky. An American flag suspended from a firetruck ladder. So many police officers from so many departments, badges banded with black tape.
It made for a fearsome display of solidarity for fellow officers murdered in the pursuit of criminals.
But on a long day of eulogy and tribute, that small moment on stage at the American Airlines Arena, those young boys, Michael, Anthony and Bryan Castillo, struggling against grief as their police officer mother Debbie -- the young widow -- pulled them into her arms, said what words could not.
The two officers died in a neighborhood perpetually wracked by gun violence, ambushed by a fugitive killer with a long rap sheet wanted for a murder back in October, the kind of mindless street killing the media hardly notice. Until Johnny Simms met a police warrant squad firing his 40-caliber Glock, the attempted arrest of a 22-year-old murderer, his flesh decorated with thug tattoos, was not the stuff of news.
Nobody on the outside pays much attention to these neighborhoods under siege from well-armed gangbangers and career criminals. We just expect the cops to do what they can to tamp down the worst offenders, to keep the gunplay from spilling out of the meanest zip codes.
On Thursday, Johnny Simms reminded the outside world just what officers who police these addresses -- and the innocents who live there -- face.
``Somewhere in this county, somewhere in this state, and surely somewhere in this nation, someone wearing a uniform is doing something they don't want to do,'' Miami Dade Police Director James Loftus said to an arena filled with uniforms.
``They're stopping a car, searching a house, walking up a driveway. Their antenna is up, saying to themselves, `Something just doesn't feel right.' They're afraid.''
Loftus is a big, barrel-chested, white-haired, tough-talking cop who could be portrayed with perfect casting by actor Brian Dennehy. When that big, barrel-chested, white-haired tough-talking cop struggled with his emotions Monday, the effect was contagious.
Police, he said, after pausing to regain control, ``are afraid for what they have to lose.''
And just what police officers have to lose was as obvious Monday afternoon as Castillo and Haworth's four grieving sons, the tearful widow and the impromptu, unscheduled remarks by Haworth's life partner, Miami-Dade Police Sgt. Rosie Diaz, who seemed impossibly brave.
The sense of self-preservation is to run, Loftus said.
``They go in anyway. That's why I love them,'' he said.
Loftus, who is incapable of uttering the saccharine stuff politicians might say at a police funeral, made no attempt to divine inspirational meaning out of the murder of his two officers by a young ex-con.
``I will not accept that they are in a better place,'' he said, gruffly. ``That's a cliché that makes my brain hurt.''
Two of his officers died holding the line. It's not a new story in tough, impoverished, dysfunctional neighborhoods.
But lately the young criminals who terrorize these places wield Glock semi-automatic pistols and assault weapons and demonstrate, night after night, a terrible, fatalistic, inexplicable bent for violence.
``I can't tell you what was in the mind of the murderer who attacked my people on Thursday,'' Loften said.
``I will not even pretend to understand evil.''
But the ramifications of evil were as apparent as three young boys, huddled on stage, overwhelmed by loss.
The memorial service for Miami-Dade police officers Roger Castillo and Amanda Haworth unfolded with the sadly familiar trappings of a police funeral. A long motor procession of patrol cars and roaring motorcycles. Blue lights against a dreary sky. An American flag suspended from a firetruck ladder. So many police officers from so many departments, badges banded with black tape.
It made for a fearsome display of solidarity for fellow officers murdered in the pursuit of criminals.
But on a long day of eulogy and tribute, that small moment on stage at the American Airlines Arena, those young boys, Michael, Anthony and Bryan Castillo, struggling against grief as their police officer mother Debbie -- the young widow -- pulled them into her arms, said what words could not.
The two officers died in a neighborhood perpetually wracked by gun violence, ambushed by a fugitive killer with a long rap sheet wanted for a murder back in October, the kind of mindless street killing the media hardly notice. Until Johnny Simms met a police warrant squad firing his 40-caliber Glock, the attempted arrest of a 22-year-old murderer, his flesh decorated with thug tattoos, was not the stuff of news.
Nobody on the outside pays much attention to these neighborhoods under siege from well-armed gangbangers and career criminals. We just expect the cops to do what they can to tamp down the worst offenders, to keep the gunplay from spilling out of the meanest zip codes.
On Thursday, Johnny Simms reminded the outside world just what officers who police these addresses -- and the innocents who live there -- face.
``Somewhere in this county, somewhere in this state, and surely somewhere in this nation, someone wearing a uniform is doing something they don't want to do,'' Miami Dade Police Director James Loftus said to an arena filled with uniforms.
``They're stopping a car, searching a house, walking up a driveway. Their antenna is up, saying to themselves, `Something just doesn't feel right.' They're afraid.''
Loftus is a big, barrel-chested, white-haired, tough-talking cop who could be portrayed with perfect casting by actor Brian Dennehy. When that big, barrel-chested, white-haired tough-talking cop struggled with his emotions Monday, the effect was contagious.
Police, he said, after pausing to regain control, ``are afraid for what they have to lose.''
And just what police officers have to lose was as obvious Monday afternoon as Castillo and Haworth's four grieving sons, the tearful widow and the impromptu, unscheduled remarks by Haworth's life partner, Miami-Dade Police Sgt. Rosie Diaz, who seemed impossibly brave.
The sense of self-preservation is to run, Loftus said.
``They go in anyway. That's why I love them,'' he said.
Loftus, who is incapable of uttering the saccharine stuff politicians might say at a police funeral, made no attempt to divine inspirational meaning out of the murder of his two officers by a young ex-con.
``I will not accept that they are in a better place,'' he said, gruffly. ``That's a cliché that makes my brain hurt.''
Two of his officers died holding the line. It's not a new story in tough, impoverished, dysfunctional neighborhoods.
But lately the young criminals who terrorize these places wield Glock semi-automatic pistols and assault weapons and demonstrate, night after night, a terrible, fatalistic, inexplicable bent for violence.
``I can't tell you what was in the mind of the murderer who attacked my people on Thursday,'' Loften said.
``I will not even pretend to understand evil.''
But the ramifications of evil were as apparent as three young boys, huddled on stage, overwhelmed by loss.
