Dallas Police Officer Patrick Zamarripa, a married father of a 2-year-old daughter, survived three combat tours of Iraq — but was gunned down in his city during the bloody assault on law enforcement.
The 32-year-old Mexican-American was one of five cops killed by snipers who targeted police during a protest over recent police shootings of black men.
“He comes to the United States to protect people here,” his dad, Rick Zamarripa, told the Washington Post. “And they take his life.”
The father posted a message on Facebook about 3:30 a.m. Friday that he “needs prayers to get through this.”
“At this moment I’m still at the hospital here in Parkland Hospital to see him be moved to the medical examiner’s office,” he wrote.
When Patrick left the Navy five years ago, he joined the Dallas Police Department and recently started working a bicycle patrol downtown.
When the elder Zamarripa heard about the shootings, he wanted to make sure his son was safe.
“Hey Patrick,” his father texted. “Are you okay?”
His son usually responded quickly to such texts, but this time there was no answer.
“I didn’t hear nothing,” Rick told the paper.
He got in touch with Zamarripa’s wife, Kristy Villasenor, who he believed was at a Texas Rangers game with their daughter, Lyncoln.
At first, she also didn’t know anything, he said, but soon was told to go to the hospital.
Rick was the first relative to arrive at the hospital, where he asked an officer, “How’s Patrick?”
“He wouldn’t tell me,” he said. “He had that look on his face. I knew.”
On social media sites, the cop saluted fallen officers and soldiers — including two New York City officers killed in 2014.
He tweeted photos of Lyncoln when she was born in 2013.
“Daddy’s got you,” he wrote. “My new reason for… life.”
On Thursday night, his dad said, the family was allowed to see his face briefly through a window.
Lyncoln called out for her father, Rick said.
“Dada,” she said. “Dada.”