Some Dallas police officers want to create a lasting memorial to the five officers who were shot and killed in an ambush last summer.
"This was the greatest loss of law enforcement life in a single incident since 9/11," said Sgt. Demetrick Pennie, president of the Dallas Fallen Officer Foundation.
"The same reverence that we show on 9/11 for those fallen officers that lost their lives there, we'd love to do that here in Dallas," Pennie added.
Working with a Colorado sculptor, the Dallas Fallen Officer Foundation envisions a 10-foot bronze statue on a four-foot base, showing a police officer hugging his family.
"The sculpture is capturing what it is to be a police officer and family," said Austin Weishel, who has created many other police memorials.
The sculpture would pay tribute to all fallen officers and their families.
"What we really wanted to capture is that moment in time when an officer does go home and they see their loved ones; they just want to give that the biggest hug they ever had given to their family members," Weishel said.
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"We call it larger than life size, we want larger than life because of that momentous situation," Pennie said.
The Dallas Fallen Officer Foundation is now starting to raise money for the project and to look for a place to display the finished piece.
"We need to have something like this," Pennie said. "This is not something where you can just etch officers' names into the side of a stone and walk away from it. We want people to remember it."
The foundation hopes a private or corporate donor will step up with the $700,000 needed to build the sculpture, and has created a crowd-funding page to also help raise the money: https://www.youcaring.com/77PoliceReflection.
