2,000 at Service Celebrate Life of Slain Officer : Memorial: Bob Henry is remembered for his compassion and his sense of humor during a funeral Mass at The Pond, attended by police from across the state.

About 2,000 people, including police officers from dozens of agencies across the state, flocked to a funeral Mass at The Pond on Wednesday to honor Newport Beach Police Officer Bob Henry, who was shot in the head last month by a man who then took his own life.

Friends and supporters, some wearing bright colors at his family’s urging to “celebrate” Henry’s life, heard the 30-year-old father of three remembered as a devoted Catholic who made the ultimate sacrifice that shadows the life of every peace officer.

But he was also remembered as “Bob-O,” a friend and brother with a goofy and good-hearted sense of humor who loved to surf, sang in a Christian rock band and proposed to his wife on his knee in front of a classroom full of children she was teaching.

“I am speaking today of a man some only knew of as a hero,” Henry’s brother, Bill Henry, told the crowd from the podium of the arena. “To me, he was not only a brother, but a best friend. I’m talking about Robert J. Henry, also known as Bob, Bob-O, Bonehead, Pony-Boy and--rightly so--Lion Heart.”

Bob Henry did not regain consciousness and clung to life in a coma for 33 days before he died at Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian on April 13.

Fellow officers, friends and family, buoyed by the faith of Henry’s wife, Patty, mounted a continuous bedside vigil to pray and exchange fond stories of the five-year police officer.

Following the funeral Mass on Wednesday, hundreds of police vehicles and a fire engine followed the white hearse carrying the officer’s coffin as it made its way up Katella Avenue to Holy Sepulcher Cemetery in Orange.

Held under gray skies, the graveside service was a far more somber affair with more than 300 people surrounding the officer’s oak casket. Five police helicopters flew overhead in a missing-man formation following a 21-gun salute by the Los Angeles Police Department Honor Guard. Row after row of police officers, mostly from the Newport Beach Police Department, stood at attention while a trumpeter played “Taps.”

The burial was not open to the public, marking a private interlude in a day of public remembering for Henry, first at The Pond, and then at a reception at the Hyatt Newporter in Newport Beach.

Hanging video screens at The Pond that usually beam images of hockey games and concerts carried instead the message of Resurrection offered by Father Stephen J. Duffin of St. Catherine of Siena Church in Laguna Beach.

“A whole police force, a whole army, cannot stop death from taking our brother,” said Duffin, who officiated the Mass as Henry’s parents, brothers, sister, wife and three small children stood nearby. “But for us, this isn’t the end, it’s a new beginning.”

Duffin called Henry’s death, which came in the line of duty, “the most beautiful form of love . . . to give his whole self for the care of his people.”

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The Bob Henry recalled most fondly at the funeral Mass was always “bitty buddy” to his father, no matter his age. He was the boy who buried his brother’s army set in the back yard mud and didn’t reveal the hiding place until the toys were caked dry. And he was a loving friend who used his humor to shepherd those close to him through trying emotional times.

Sheila McHenry, a friend of Bob and Patty Henry who met them through their involvement with Search, the Catholic young adult retreat group of the Diocese of Orange, said Bob Henry cheered her up with his jokes after her cancer surgery eight years ago.

McHenry recalled telling Bob Henry that doctors had removed a three-pound tumor the size of a volleyball from her abdomen in a grueling five-hour surgery.

“He said, ‘Yeah, right. The surgery was probably one hour long and they were playing volleyball for the rest of the four,’ ” McHenry said in one of four eulogies offered during the two-hour Catholic Mass.

Close friends who gathered to talk about Bob Henry after the Mass remembered his love of weightlifting and his zest for athletic achievement. It was his friends at Mater Dei High School who nicknamed him “Bob-O the Punisher,” a name that quickly stuck among his close-knit family and other friends.

And he was one of four schoolmates so close, they dubbed themselves “pachacos” in an imaginary grade school fraternity, playing sports and working summer jobs at one another’s side.

“In our early teens, I would go play basketball at his house. He had his patented 13-foot shot that he would shoot and it was always nothing but net,” said Mike Guerena, 29, one of only two surviving “pachacos” who met Bob Henry in first grade at St. Barbara’s Elementary School and also went to Mater Dei High School with him.

“He would have really enjoyed today,” he said.

Guerena recalled the time that Bob Henry, who had gotten them both jobs in the mail room of a real estate office, slipped a cardboard box over his torso and began hopping around out of boredom, only to be surprised by his boss.

Then there was the surfing trip to Baja California, when Bob Henry and Stephen Mouser, 29, were enjoying the waves only to be startled by a cluster of fins between them and the beach.

“Bob started to freak,” Mouser remembered fondly. “But we just stayed calm and realized they were only dolphins.”

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The mass served as a public grieving and the seed of healing for more than 1,000 police officers from all over the state who came to honor Henry, citing the brotherhood that unites them.

Fourteen Fremont Police Department traffic officers--half the department’s traffic division--drove to Orange County on Tuesday in a four-motorcycle, five-car procession to attend the funeral. The division’s other half attended the funeral of an Oakland police officer recently killed by a gunman.

“No matter where we work, we’re all doing the same type of job for a safe community,” said Fremont Police Officer William Carattini. “It could be any one of us at any time.”

Some, like Costa Mesa Police Officer Jess Gilman, came on their days off in “class A” uniforms, donning white gloves reserved for the most serious occasions.

“He was just a phenomenal individual,” Gilman said of Henry, who he joined in calls on several occasions because their cities bordered one another. “He and I were on a call once involving some teen-agers. He used a lot of compassion.”

Bob Henry was the 38th Orange County officer killed in the line of duty. He was found critically wounded underneath the body of Garden Grove resident Carlos Caicedo, 24, in a church parking lot March 12. Police said Caicedo had left a suicide note by his bedside, and was despondent and intoxicated.

Newport Beach Police Chief Robert J. McDonell, who offered one of the eulogies of the officer, vowed to watch over Bob Henry’s wife and three children: Bobby, 6, Jenna, 2, and Alyssa, 2 months.

“We pledge to you Bob Henry that we will close ranks and protect your family until you are all happily together,” he said through tears.

The loss has torn deep into the psyche of the Newport Beach Police Department, Officer Mark Hamilton said in a eulogy of Henry.

“Bob gave us hope. Bob gave us courage. Bob gave us strength,” Hamilton said. “On April 13, 1995, Bob gave us his life.”

About 400 people gathered after the funeral at a reception around a gated pool at the Hyatt Newporter hotel in Newport Beach, a gathering arranged by the family to thank those who have offered support.

Bouquets from public protection agencies throughout the state adorned the gate and the pool area, and Patty Henry greeted and hugged dozens of guests.

“Mrs. Henry is rock, pure and simple,” said Sgt. Andy Gonis, the department’s spokesman. “She has been an inspiration to all of us. She has been a role model throughout.”

As for the department, he said, “whatever she has needed, we have tried to be there.” But everyone has tried, as well, to give her enough room to grieve, Gonis said.

A group of sixth-grade girls from Roy O. Andersen Elementary School who attended the gathering had never met Bob Henry--but they had followed his progress in the hospital, day by day. They organized bake sales and garage sales in the days following the shooting, eventually raising nearly $400 for the Henry family.

“A lot of kids did just as much as they could,” said Connie Chozas, 12. “We put a sign up, saying ‘All profits go to Officer Henry.’ ”

Times staff writers Greg Hernandez and Julie Marquis contributed to this report.