Mourners honor slain CHA officer

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The body of former CHA police officer Stephen P. Peters is carried out of Phillip Neri Church, 2132 E. 72nd Street after his funeral Mass.

Slain former Chicago Housing Authority police officer Stephen Peters loved the comic hero Superman, and adopted that name for himself.

So his mother, Laura Peters, slipped a Superman toy into her son's jacket to accompany him in his coffin.

Peters' father, Robert Peters, said that gesture "was the hardest thing I've ever seen her do."

"There's a hole in the universe now," said Peters, speaking before his son's funeral mass at St. Philip Neri Church on the South Side.

Stephen P. Peters, 44, of Forest Park, was gunned down along with Chicago Police Officer Michael Flisk, 46, on Nov. 26.

Flisk had been responding to Peters' call reporting a burglary, after parts from his car were stolen from his mother's garage.

Timothy Herring Jr., 19, a parolee who has been charged with the murders, was allegedly returning to the scene to collect the stolen parts from a trash can when he killed both men.

About 300 mourners gathered at the Catholic church this morning to remember Peters, an AT&T engineer who had served as a police officer for both the Chicago Housing Authority and south suburban Robbins.

Mourners included dozens of uniformed officers from Chicago, Metra, and suburban police departments, many of whom remembered Peters from his time with the CHA force, disbanded in 1999.