Officers' wives gather to support Wride family, police community


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PROVO — Eight different groups of police officers' wives got together Monday to prepare ribbons for Utah County Sheriff's Sgt. Cory Wride's funeral. The ribbon is a symbol of remembrance for fallen officers, but their gathering means even more than that.

In a Utah County kitchen, the women prepared ribbons to pass out at the funeral and give each other support. They invited KSL cameras in, but asked KSL not to use their last names due to the sensitivity of the work some of their husband are involved in.

"It rocks all of our worlds when somebody loses their husband this way," Laura said. "All of us send our husbands out the door every day not really knowing if they are going to come home, and sending them out there knowing people want to hurt them."

"They love their husbands just as much as I do," Nicol said. "They understand what it means for their husband to walk out the door every day and put that badge on."

They started this tradition when officer Jared Francom, of the Ogden Police Department, was shot and killed two years ago. Their sisterhood expanded on Facebook.

"It's been happening so often lately that it makes it even more scary," a woman named Ferris said.

As the shooting unfolded Thursday, the women said they were frightened, shaking, not knowing whose world would be turned upside down.

"Just as we get our feet underneath us on the last shooting, it happens again. It keeps happening, and something has to change," Laura said.

They're from different departments, but say they all bleed blue. One lawman's death affects them all.

"When someone's hurt, we are all hurt," Emiley said. "Because we are a community that bands together and stands together."

The women said as tough as it is on them, they know that a fatality in the police ranks is tougher on their husbands. Those officers know it could have been them, and the slain officer was their brother.

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Jed Boal

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