Right now, there's the funeral procession for Poughkeepsie police officer John Falcone is heading to Brooklyn, where he will be buried at the Cemetery of the Holy Cross. Falcone was killed in the line of duty last Friday, when he was shot by a man in a parking lot near the Poughkeepsie Metro-North station. Earlier today, thousands of mourners gathered inside and outside the Putnam County church where the funeral was held.
Falcone, 44, and other police officers were responding to reports of a shooting. Apparently Lee Welch, 27, had just shot his wife. The couple had been separated for a few weeks and Jessica Welch, 28, had come into Poughkeepsie with their child. According to the Poughkeepsie Journal, "Falcone and other officers confronted Welch as he stood in the parking lot with his 3-year-old daughter and ordered him to drop his gun. When Welch fled toward the train station, Falcone and Officers Thomas Matthews and William Badner pursued him. Matthews subsequently sustained a dislocated shoulder grappling with Welch." None of the police officers fired their guns, "leading them to conclude Welch had shot himself — either intentionally or unintentionally — as well as Falcone."
Archbishop Timothy Dolan officiated at the funeral; he noted Jesus said, "No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends," and said of Falcone, "We mourn him, we miss him, we will never forget him."
