Colleagues and friends gathered at Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills on Wednesday to bid farewell to Los Angeles Police Department Officer Houston Ryan Tipping, who died after suffering a spinal cord injury during a training accident at the agency’s Elysian Park academy.
Tipping’s father fought back tears as he paid tribute to his son, publicly professing “how much I love my son, how proud I am of him.’”
“My son Houston was naturally kind,” he said. “He genuinely cared about people. He had the perfect character to be an LAPD officer.”
According to LAPD Chief Michel Moore, Tipping was “an officer who held such promise for this city.”
Tipping, 32, died May 29. He is survived by his parents, Richard and Shirley; his stepfather, Bob; his siblings Kat and Tyler; and his girlfriend, Brittany.
The five-year department veteran worked out of the LAPD’s Devonshire Division.
City News Service contributed to this story.
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