With lights flashing, a massive procession of Charlotte-Mecklenburg police, Mecklenburg County sheriff's deputies and N.C. Department of Adult Corrections officers transported the body of N.C. Adult Corrections Officer Sam Poloche to the Forest Lawn West Funeral Home on Freedom Drive.
Led by a fleet of motorcycles, the procession, including the hearse with the body of Poloche, left from the Mecklenburg County Medical Examiner’s office around 3 p.m. Friday.
The huge line of cars traveled down Interstate 85, which was closed on one side. Cars on the other side of the road were stopped, with some people getting out of their vehicles to look at the procession. Firetrucks and other law enforcement cars dotted the route.
Poloche died Monday, April 29, along with three other law enforcement officers, while trying to serve a warrant on a suspect in northeast Charlotte.
He was a husband and father of two sons, 18 and 21. One of his sons is graduating high school this year, and the other is a student at UNC-Charlotte.
The procession follows a funeral held Friday morning for another officer killed during the incident, Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Officer Joshua Eyer. Eyer is the first of the four killed to be laid to rest.
Poloche’s funeral will be held on Monday, May 13 at First Baptist Church, the same place Eyer’s was held today.
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