News Photo by Julie Riddle

More than 100 uniformed and retired police and fire personnel pay tribute Saturday to Deputy Jim Budnik of the Presque Isle County Sheriff’s Department. A funeral Mass at St. Casimir Catholic Church in Posen included law enforcement and fire department honors for the sheriff’s deputy, firefighter, and EMT who, at 43, lost his fight with cancer on December 5. Uniformed personnel lined the center aisle at the beginning and end of the service and saluted their fallen brother as shots were fired in his honor, and an American flag was presented to Budnik’s wife. Following police custom, Presque Isle County Sheriff Joe Brewbaker played an End of Watch call over a police radio, a police dispatcher twice issuing a call to the officer, a call met by silence.