BELGRADE, MT (CNN/KBZK) - A funeral took place on Tuesday to honor a Montana police officer killed in the line of duty. Broadwater County sheriff's deputy Mason Moore was shot several times during a traffic stop last week.
"He was a man of love, and he wasn't afraid to express it,” Pastor Curtis Crow said. Mason Moore's love for his family, his community and his God was the constant theme at his funeral on Tuesday.
"Mason would look at me to make sure he had my attention and say, 'I love you, I really, really love you.' He made sure to tell me that often,” his wife Jodi Moore said.
“His last words to me were 'I love you brother, and I'll see you at the office,'" Crow said.
"Mason's hugs were an example of his love. Strong arms wrapping around you on the outside with a strong squeeze to show he wasn't just throwing his arms around you,” his wife said.
As preparation for any potential future tragedies in his deputy duties, Moore wrote his wife a letter in case anything ever happened to him. "He said, 'don't let hate take over your life. I enjoyed every moment of life with you, enjoy life,'" his wife said her husband wrote.
Moore found more than one way to serve his community, seamlessly transitioning between his role as a deputy and a volunteer fireman.
"After he helped us to extricate and transfer the patients to the ambulance, he looked down at his watch and said that he had to go on shift with the sheriff's department soon. And it couldn't have been more than 10 minutes and I look over and there stands Deputy Moore, all uniformed, showered, shaved, it was just like he stepped out of a phone booth,” said fireman Charles Eastty.
And as a parent, he was remembered as the type of father that played dress up in crowns and glitter with this daughter, and lit up when talking about his son's cross country achievements, always managing to be firm while still loving.
"Mason was never one to back down from fear, a dangerous situation, when others would run away, he would run to, because he was a man of integrity,” Crow said.
“My heart's broken. I'm a man without spirit right now, it's definitely broken. And I know everybody else has a broken spirit, a broken heart,” Sheriff Wynn Meehan said.
In addition to his wife, Mason Moore also leaves behind three children. He was 42.
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