Wiregrass officers honored at ceremony

Coffee County Sheriff’s Deputy Charles Driggers Jr. remembers the day his father was killed in the line of duty.

“He was going to serve a warrant, and he was ambushed,” Driggers Jr. said of his father, Charles Driggers Sr., an Elba Police officer who was killed on Sept. 2, 1964. “It’s a tragedy, but folks, unless it happens to them, don’t realize what we do and what we put on the line,” he said.

The Alabama Sports Festival honored that sacrifice Tuesday night at the Dothan Civic Center, playing host to an “Honoring Our Heroes” ceremony.

Festival president and CEO Ron Creel awarded a Medal of Distinction to more than a hundred officers from around the Wiregrass who have served 10 or more consecutive years. He also bestowed a Medal of Valor to the families of 10 Wiregrass officers who lost their lives in the line of duty.

Driggers Jr. received two medals, one for his own 38 years of law enforcement service and one for his father’s sacrifice nearly 45 years ago.

Houston County Commission Chairman Mark Culver said the officers and their families deserve the medals, but they also deserve the appreciation of their communities.

“Those of us who aren’t in law enforcement sometimes forget what they put on the line every day,” Culver said. “We’re all in this together, and they need to know that if they need us, we’re here for them like their loved ones were here for us.”

For some, the tragic loss of a loved one might be enough to steer future generations away from law enforcement careers. For the Driggers, however, it’s become a family tradition.

“I guess it’s just in my genes. It’s what I was supposed to do,” said Charles Driggers III, a deputy for the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Department. “My grandfather died about 30 years before I was born, but he raised my father, and my father is a good man, so I know he was a good man.”