Tears welled in Ricky Cobb Sr.'s eyes as his son's casket was carried into the Immanuel Baptist Tabernacle Saturday.
Michele Amos, a longtime family friend, rested her hand on the 56-year-old father's back. He had little to say. But more than a hundred people gathered with Cobb to celebrate the life of his son Ricky Cobb II, the 33-year-old Black man shot dead by a state trooper during a July 31 traffic stop.
A slideshow of the younger Cobb dancing, hugging family and smiling with his kids played as people filed into the Robbinsdale church. Some embraced while others cried behind sunglasses. Lights along the walls illuminated the words "Faith," "Hope," and "Love" as Marvin Sapp's "Never Would Have Made It" played through the church speakers.
Cobb and his siblings were baptized in the church nearly a decade ago. As friends and family reminisced, many said their final goodbyes to a man who made a lasting impact on their lives.
"Uncle Ricky, a million words cannot bring you back. I know because I have tried," one family member, Kiyah, said in Cobb's obituary.
Cobb was killed after State Patrol troopers pulled him over on Interstate 94 for driving without taillights. Troopers learned that Cobb was wanted for questioning about an alleged felony-level violation of a domestic order for protection in Ramsey County, but he declined to exit his vehicle.
"We just have some stuff to talk about. … We'll explain," trooper Brett Seide said in body camera footage released a day after the shooting. The Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, the agency investigating the shooting, named Seide and Ryan Londregan as the troopers involved.
Family later confirmed that the violation troopers referred to involved an active protective order taken out by the mother of Cobb's 5- and 6-year-old children.
