Lisa Langley Robertson, left, and her late husband, UPD Officer Robert Langley, right. Submitted photo.
OXFORD, Miss. – Law enforcement officers from across the state gathered Friday with friends and family members of fallen University of Mississippi police Officer Robert Langley to pay tribute on the 10th anniversary of his death in the line of duty.
Langley, who also was a veteran of the war in Afghanistan, was killed Oct. 21, 2006, while assisting with a traffic stop on Jackson Avenue near campus. He left behind a wife, two sons and two stepdaughters. His widow, Lisa Langley Robertson, tearfully said at the memorial at Paris-Yates Chapel that her husband’s tragic death and all the pain that came with it had one positive consequence.
“This tragedy brought our community so close together,” she said. “He would be so proud. As so many have spoken today, he was loved and he still is loved.”
Her remarks came at the end of a somber service during which friends and colleagues remembered Langley for being a dedicated police officer, loving father and good friend who was always bringing people together. His widow challenged the crowd to reflect on how they themselves would want to be remembered.
“If you’re not completely satisfied at this point, you still have time to write your story,” Robertson said.
The Ole Miss student driving the vehicle that killed Langley pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to 20 years. The tragedy shocked and saddened the UM community and prompted changes aimed to create a safer campus environment.
Langley, 30, served in the Mississippi Army National Guard and had returned from a 14-month deployment to Afghanistan six months before he died. He also had become certified to work with the university’s K-9 officer, Truus, and served on both UPD’s motorcycle and bike patrols, among other duties. He grew up in foster care and was a high school running back at Madison-Ridgeland Academy, and also played running back at Delta State University.
His son Robbie Langley, a junior at Lafayette High School, wore his own football jersey to the ceremony ahead of the game Friday night. Langley is the starting kicker, and UPD helped arrange with his coach for him to be made captain for the game even though he is only a junior. He learned the news just before kickoff.
At the memorial Friday, Langley’s former UPD coworkers recalled that the officer radiated positive energy every day, and they all drew strength from it.
Robbie Langley’s football team is reading “The Energy Bus: 10 Rules to Fuel Your Life, Work and Team with Positive Energy” by Jon Gordon. The book uses the analogy of a bus needing to be fueled with good gas (positive energy) instead of negative fuel as a metaphor for living.
“I’m not trying to say be like my dad,” Robbie Langley said. “That’s not what we’re trying to say, but from what everyone else has had to say today, he made an impact.
“I guarantee you he had positive energy on his bus. … Please don’t put negative energy in your bus before you go to work or go out or do anything because it’s going to have an impact on someone and you can’t take it back.”
At the ceremony, the Langley family was presented with a fallen officer’s flag honoring him.
The tragedy has had long-lasting effects on the community. A stretch of Jackson Avenue where Langley died was renamed for him with a marker placed there. All UPD vehicles still have “B-5,” which was Langley’s radio call number, on them, and all officers wear a B-5 emblem on their uniform. His picture hangs in the entrance to UPD.
Langley’s death sparked the creation of the Alcohol Task Force, which was charged with finding ways to make the university and Oxford community safer. As a result of the recommendations issued in 2007, the university created a two-strike policy for students with drug and alcohol violations.
The task force report also led to comprehensive health assessments of UM undergraduates, the creation of the Office of Health Promotion and the mandatory online education and prevention initiative, AlcoholEdu.
UM also launched an awareness campaign to explain the university’s expectations for student behavior on game days and other major campus events, as well as consequences of violating those expectations. The university and Oxford also created the Oxford-University Transit, a public transportation system.
Lafayette County Sheriff’s Deputy Lynn Webb, a former UPD officer who rode on the motorcycle unit with Langley, worked with him on the night shift. She was reassigned to the same shift as Langley the week he died and got to spend the last few days working closely with her good friend.
Webb said she, Langley and the other UPD officers were a close group who often hunted, fished and rode all-terrain vehicles together when they weren’t on duty. She remembers Langley as fun-loving, but someone who worked hard to be the best at his job.
He checked in weekly with his UPD coworkers while he was deployed to Afghanistan. They would ask him if he was OK, but he would respond that his work was classified, just so he could keep the conversation focused on UPD happenings.
At the memorial service, Webb fondly recalled spending a few late-night hours hitting baseballs with Langley at Swayze Field the week he died. She was on duty with him the night he lost his life and said it’s important for coworkers, especially those in law enforcement, to have that kind of closeness.
“He had told me that he never wanted to be alone,” Webb said, choking back tears. “I feel that God put me on that shift that night to be with him because he knew something was going to happen. I just want you to remember that you don’t have to go out and be friends with your coworkers when you’re off, but when you put on that uniform, we are all brothers and sisters.
“You have to know something about each person you work with so you that know how they tick and you know what it takes to back them up. You have to know deep down in your heart that you have that person’s back. Robert had our back every day. You never had to guess where Robert was. He was there.”