By Erin Smith
The first annual Bladen County Peace Officers Memorial Service will be conducted on Wednesday at 10 a.m. at the Elizabethtown Baptist Church Christian Activities Center. This will be the first such event for Bladen County. The public is invited to attend.
“This entire week is dedicated to fallen officers,” said Bladen County Chief Deputy Larry Guyton.
Guyton said the fallen officers from Bladen County will be recognized and their families will be in attendance for the service. In Bladen County there have been five fallen officers. They are Dwayne Hester, Jamie Collins, Brian Joe Ramey, James Bell, and Roy Fores. Their names appear on the Fallen Officers’ Memorial located at the Bladen County Sheriff’s Office.
Guyton said, “We have never had a peace officer memorial service in the county. When we moved to our new facility we decided we were going to have one.”
Guyton said plans for the event came about after the Bladen County Law Enforcement Officers Association requested to have one. He said when the Sheriff’s Office moved into their new building, they now have adequate space to conduct a Peace Officers Memorial Service in front of the Fallen Officer’s Memorial. He added, with the threat of inclement weather forecast for Wednesday, it was decided to move the event from the Sheriff’s Office to the Elizabethtown Baptist Church.
Guyton said the entire cadet corps at Paul R. Brown Leadership Academy will take part in the service. He said the White Lake, Elizabethtown and Bladenboro Police Departments have all been invited to take part as well as the North Carolina Highway Patrol.
There will be a service conducted in Washington, D.C. today (Tuesday, May 15th) where the names of law enforcement officers who were killed in the line of duty in 2017 will be added to the national memorial. Services are also conducted throughout the United States to commemorate these individuals. Last week New Hanover County and Cumberland County both held their Peace Officers Memorial Services. Brunswick County conducted their memorial service two weeks ago.
The Elizabethtown Baptist Church is located at 1800 West Broad Street, Elizabethtown.
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