LORIS, SC (WBTW) – The Horry County Sheriff’s Office honored a fallen hero on Friday.
Exactly 16 years ago, Lt. Randy Gerald was shot and killed trying to break up a fight on his way home from J. Reuben Long Detention center. On Friday, members of the sheriff’s office gathered with Gerald’s family and friends to hold a memorial for the late lieutenant where he’s buried, near Flag Patch Baptist Church in Loris. “Every day, he’s the first thing on my mind when I wake up in the morning. 16 years later,” said his widow, Gwendolyn Gerald.
Lt. Gerald was off the clock, but that didn’t stop him from trying to help what he thought was a car accident off of Highway 701, on the evening of December 29th 2001. “I think if he had to go, that was the way he would want to go. That was what he lived. That was who he was,” said Mrs. Gerald. She said her husband never hesitated to help a stranger. Though it made her nervous, she said he always told her, “I do it because of you and the girls. I hope somebody would return the favor one day.”
Horry County Sheriff Phillip Thompson said he and his deputies lost a great lieutenant, and an even better friend. “It’s hard to describe the feeling that goes through you. Randy was a good person. A person people felt very comfortable being around. They looked at him as a friend, kind of a father figure for a lot of people.”
According to Gerald, it wasn’t just the sheriff’s office and her husband’s colleagues at J. Reuben Long that mourned him. “I had bags of cards from inmates. All of them said, ‘you made us feel human.” Now Lt. Gearld’s legacy lives on in the halls of Gerald Tower at J. Reuben Long, and in the hearts and minds of those he left behind. “I know he’s proud of them, and he’s proud of us. And I’m so proud of him,” Gerald said.
