VIDEO: Howard Snider, Ames Police Officer, Remembered Saturday

Family and friends of Ames Police Sgt. said goodbye Saturday to a gruff and tough marine, mentor and police officer who once posed for a photo with blank bullets sticking out of every hole in his face.

Snider, 51, died June 17, after jumping into Lake Geode in an attempt to reach his daughter who had drifted from a ramp in a fishing boat.

His funeral was held Saturday at Cornerstone Church.

A childhood friend and fellow officers made it sound as if Snider was the last person a bad man would want after him and perhaps not the first person wanted at a rescue.

Steve Wilson, who grew up with Snider in the small Iowa town of Fort Madison, said Snider once hung Wilson's younger brother David out of a moving car and forced him to imitate superman before pulling him back inside. When Wilson crashed his motorcycle into a tree -- smashing his left foot, left hand and knocking himself out in the process -- he woke up with Snider standing over him.

“There's Howard kicking me, calling me a few choice words and telling me to get back on my bike, so Howard is a man of great sympathy,” Wilson said filling Cornerstone Church with laughter.

Wilson said some will remember Snider's death as a great tragedy: dying trying to save his daughter on Father's Day.

But Wilson said not to think of it that way.

Wilson said Snider's back wasn't hurting as much as it had been and he was spending the day fishing with his wife and children. They were the people who meant the most to him, Wilson said.

“He went out the way he wanted to. He was caring for his family,” Wilson said.  

SEE MORE ON PATCH