SGT. RYAN RUSSELL

An outpouring of support and a sad day. I, like thousands of others, was drawn to watch the funeral of Sgt. Ryan Russell yesterday. The procession began in the morning with the long walk to the Rogers Centre in Toronto, the only building in Toronto deemed large enough to hold the expected numbers. Originally, 4,000 were expected to attend; police units from across the province, and the country, some from the U.S. as well. In the end, the estimate was well over 12,000, and perhaps over 14,000 attended. The Mounted Unit, the Canine Unit, EMS, RCMP, police uniforms that could not be identified while watching. Throngs of civilians lining the streets, it was quite overwhelming. I can't imagine how it must have been for the family, all so strong. Sgt. Ryans' two year old son, who was there well into the service, and his wife, Christine, amazing lady. How she was able to compose herself to speak at the end of the service is beyond me.

Many people there, and watching , described it as eerie, and it was...other than when the bagpipes were going through, all you could hear were the marching footsteps. It was really odd, silence except for the sound of that. An interesting comment from an interviewed spectator...she was standing near the canine unit and said the dogs were so surprisingly quiet...until the hearse went by and they dogs began to "cry" as she termed it.
The service was scheduled for 1 p.m. and was delayed an hour, due to the numbers still marching to the Rogers Centre. There was room for 10,000 and smaller room holding 5,000 was set up with a large screen. These pictures (taken of my t.v., and unfortunately with light reflection from the windows) do not honestly represent the full impact of watching this. I certainly was in tears for a good part of this service.

This was the bottleneck at the entrance of the R.C. You can see the time is just after 1 p.m. when the funeral was scheduled to begin. It was another hour like this, and already thousands inside.

It would be hard to explain the profound effect this death of a policeman had on everyone. Perhaps it was a combination of a senseless killing, being run down with a stolen tuck, Ryan being only 35, a young father and husband, someone described by everyone who knew him well as an exemplary human being, not only a highly respected police officer. I don't know. I was just one of thousands 'involved' in this.

An hour later, a long walk in. The family followed after the coffin was set at the front.

There were a number of speakers, not political, and some wonderful songs that were certainly my undoing, two of my favorite and a wonderful song composed and sung by a lady named Kimberley, who was a close family friend. It was lovely. She named it Ryans' song. And after all this...and it was a long service...his wife goes up on the stage to speak. Such a strong lady. It was just all so very sad. I'm very glad to have seen so much support for the police service in general yesterday..everyone coming together. I hope everyone "remembers".