‘Not all heroes wear capes’: Hundreds pack funeral for slain retired Rock Hill officer
Cops work in a loud, boisterous, unpredictable world. That world is sometimes violent.
But a cop’s funeral, when the officer is the victim of that violence, is the opposite of loud.
It was so quiet Thursday afternoon inside First Baptist Church in Rock Hill for the memorial service for retired Rock Hill Police Department Lt. Larry Vaughan that, even filled with hundreds of police officers and their families, a cough or footfall echoed through the huge sanctuary.
The dozens of officers who stood lining the church entrance in dress uniforms with spit-shined shoes said nothing. The SWAT team stood wordless in full camouflage uniforms. Firefighters waited silently outside with a huge American flag flying from their fire truck.
No sounds except soft crying — including from a few hardened police officers — intruded when police Chief Chris Watts presented the folded American flag to Vaughan’s family.
Vaughan, 54, a 30-year veteran of the department who only retired in September, was found dead at his apartment in downtown Rock Hill last Friday after he was assaulted, according to the York County Coroner and York County Sheriff’s Office.
York County sheriff’s deputies arrested a former Chester County deputy, Evan Robert Hawthorne, 27, for murder late Friday. Hawthorne remains in the York County jail without bail pending trial.
But during the funeral service, there was no mention of charges or trials. The only talk was of Vaughan’s service to the people of Rock Hill for three decades.
Jody Long, a former Rock Hill officer who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and knows more than a bit about service before self, said Vaughan spent a career training other officers to help the public who had been harmed by crime.
“He got his satisfaction helping victims, and helping other officers,” Long told the packed sanctuary.
Vaughan, known as “LV,” started on patrol and worked his way up to SWAT commander, supervisor of detectives and other top roles in the department. Vaughan also trained many of Rock Hill’s officers in patrol, driving, firearms and other tactics.
One of his two daughters, Tyler Vaughan, spoke about her father’s commitment to his family and his “brothers and sisters in blue.”
Vaughan’s sister, Lori Williams, said Vaughan deferred the limelight of police work to others while he worked to help the public.
“He was my hero,” Williams said. “Not all heroes wear capes.”
The service was streamed online on the church website, but hundreds still went in person. Not all were cops, either. The Rock Hill mayor and city council members were there, among other dignitaries. But there were also tough-looking guys in jeans with rough, callused hands.
The police department chaplain, the Rev. Tom Patterson, told the mourners that Vaughan, like the rest of law enforcement, was their friend and their peer. Above all, he said, Vaughan cared for them all.
“LV was a servant,” Patterson said.
This story was originally published July 29, 2021 at 4:53 PM.
