Moments of silence in suburbs for Dallas police

A small group of residents gathered in Memorial Park in Arlington Heights on Friday afternoon for a moment of silence and prayer for the five police officers who were killed in Dallas.

"These people are heroes. They put themselves in harm's way for us every day," said Jim Constantine of Arlington Heights, who organized the memorial. "People have to come together as citizens instead of being against one another."

In Waukegan, Lake County State's Attorney Michael Nerheim and Lake County Undersheriff Raymond Rose held a moment of silence at Lincoln Square outside the county courthouse for 100 or so employees.

"It's appropriate to come together in a moment like this for people who put their lives on the line every day," said Lake County Judge Chuck Smith.

Rose said the violence hinders the urgent conversations society should be having.

"What happened in Dallas will not solve anything, on either side of the equation," he said.

"To bring this to a solution, we should be meeting and talking. Violence by either side will not solve anything."

In Arlington Heights, where Constantine was joined by his wife, daughters and a few others, he said he came up with the prayer service on the spur of the moment Friday to send a message of support to local police.

"This is a safe community, in no small part because of the Arlington Heights police," Constantine said. "I just wanted to make sure the people of Dallas were honored for what they did and that the people of Arlington Heights know we appreciate them for all they do."

Arlington Heights Deputy Chiefs Andrew Whowell and Michael Hernandez attended the memorial to thank residents for their support.

"We're received numerous calls of support and letters from citizens in our community since last night," Whowell said. "We're blessed here in Arlington Heights with citizens like these folks who come out and support us so we just wanted to say thank you."

Greg Padovani, chairman of the village's veterans memorial committee, led the group in reciting the "Our Father" at the end of the moment of silence.

John Thrash and his wife, Toni Higgins-Thrash, stopped at the service for a moment, saying they are disturbed by the violence happening around the country. The couple are comfort dog handlers for Lutheran Church Charities and have a son who lives in Dallas.

"This is getting to be routine. There's so much discontent everywhere. It's just a lot of tragedy," said Higgins-Thrash.

In Waukegan, Assistant State's Attorney Reggie Mathews said he appreciates the work that police officers do. More needs to be done, he said, to "eradicate the division between law enforcement and civilians because each side can understand each other."

Mathews works on the Lake County gang task force. "Because of what I do, I understand how hard the job they (police) do every day," he said.

Nerheim and Rose each gave a quick speech, thanking the employees, judges and police officers for attending, and then concluded with a moment of silence.

"This is not about speeches," Nerheim said. "This is about honoring the officers and their families with a moment of silence."

After the Arlington Heights memorial, a woman walked up to the park and was critical that the group had not held a service to honor Philando Castile and Alton Sterling, the black men killed during interactions with police in Baton Rouge and Minnesota this week.

The woman, who was white, would not identify herself and left the memorial shortly after.