Police Bomb Experts From Across the U.S. Mourn ‘2 of the Best’

After the memorial service Friday for Los Angeles police bomb squad members Arleigh McCree and Ron Ball, those wishing to pay their respects filed slowly past the seated families of the two detectives.

The mourners stooped to whisper sympathetic words to each widow, to shake the hands of each child left behind when Ball and McCree were killed Saturday while trying to defuse a bomb in North Hollywood.

Then the mourners would pause to breathe a sad sigh before heading for the door, hardly noticing the small group of somber, dry-eyed men in dark suits sitting nearby.

But they also were related to Ball and McCree--members of same tightly knit family that is the Los Angeles Police Department’s bomb squad.

And in their own stolid way, they, too, had come to grieve.

Only after the Scottish Rite Temple had emptied of all but a handful of other mourners did the detectives, alone and in pairs, offer their condolences.

‘A Tragic Loss’

“It’s a tragic loss for us, something I’ll never forget,” said Detective Robert J. Gollhofer, one of the nine remaining explosives experts. “It shakes everybody up, but it’s just one of those things that happens.”

About 3,000 people--most of them police officers--jammed the temple to say goodby to McCree, 46, who commanded the bomb squad, and Ball, 43.

Both detectives, particularly McCree, were highly regarded as explosives experts, and the memorial was attended by bomb disposal specialists from dozens of law enforcement agencies across the United States and from as far away as Great Britain.

Salt Lake City Police Officer Michael Riedel and three other Salt Lake City officers worked all day Wednesday, left at midnight and drove 13 hours to attend. They came at their own expense, on their own time.

“These people mean so much to me and to the citizens of this community and my community,” Riedel said. “Arleigh is probably one of the most professional policemen in the world. He put together the Salt Lake City bomb program.”

A member of the Oklahoma County sheriff’s bomb disposal unit, Bob Heady, and Sgt. John Windle, his counterpart on the Oklahoma City Police Department, drove out together, a 27-hour trip, in Heady’s car. They are returning to Oklahoma today.

“When I heard about it, I couldn’t believe it--still can’t believe it. They were two of the best. . . .,” Heady said. “If you could ask Arleigh and Ronald what they would leave with us, they would say, ‘Find out what went wrong so others don’t have the same thing happen. Find out what went wrong and get back on the job.’ ”

At the service, a kilted bagpiper played “Amazing Grace”; a police bugler played taps. Police Chief Daryl F. Gates read a telegram from President Reagan commending the two detectives, and later he told the mourners he could not remember when death had been so deeply felt in the 7,000-member department.

McCree’s widow, Edie, her voice unwavering, stood on the temple’s stage and recounted personal scenes from her late husband’s life: Arleigh as a boy, Arleigh in the Navy, Arleigh as a Los Angeles policeman.

But for many of the explosives experts, perhaps nothing was more poignant that the eulogy delivered by Ball’s partner, Jimmy L. Trahin.

“All of us know what kind of job it really is,” he said. “You can have all the equipment available, all the experience and take all the required precautions. There is still that unknown factor--the calculated risk. Ron and Arleigh died doing what they believed in.”