KANAB, Utah -- Soft music played as hundreds of people from across the country crowded into a Mormon church in a small Utah town for the funeral of the spokesman for the Oregon armed standoff.
Pictures of Robert "LaVoy" Finicum and his family were displayed at the church's entrance Friday, along with a saddle and a painting of a cowboy next to his horse.
Mourners filled the main pews, gymnasium and several overflow rooms in Kanab, near the Arizona line. Others stood against the walls. Some small children held American flags in their hands.
Police shot and killed the Arizona rancher during a Jan. 26 traffic stop after they say he reached for a gun. His supporters called it an ambush.
At a viewing Friday prior to Finicum's funeral, pickup trucks flying American flags filled the church parking lot in Kanab, Utah. One truck had a flyer with a picture of Finicum and the words, "Murdered by the FBI." On another vehicle, someone had written a favorite saying of the rancher's: "By dang, I'm mad."
Ben Matthews, of Port Huron, Michigan, says he went to Oregon during the occupation and called Finicum "a hero to me."
Colorado resident Dallas Ahrens said Finicum was just "glowing with energy."
