WEBSTER, N.Y. (AP) - Thousands of police and firefighters are paying respects to a police lieutenant slain in a fiery Christmas Eve ambush on the shore of Lake Ontario.
The funeral of Lt. Michael Chiapperini is being held Sunday in a high school in the town of Webster, where Chiapperini was also a volunteer fireman. Chiapperini and fellow firefighter Tomasz Kaczowka were fatally shot by William Spengler early Monday morning when they arrived at a fire that Spengler had set at his lakeside home. Two other firefighters were wounded before Spengler killed himself.
A long line of police, firefighters, and state troopers, hats clutched across their chests, filed silently past Chiapperini's flag-draped casket in the high school auditorium before the service began.
Kaczowka's funeral is on Monday.
