Pennsylvania detectives killed in an ambush are remembered for saving lives and helping others

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HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — The three detectives killed this week in one of Pennsylvania’s deadliest days for police this century are men who will be missed for their humility, hard work and willingness to help others, say those who knew them.

The detectives — Mark Baker, Cody Becker and Isaiah Emenheiser — were shot to death when they were ambushed as they entered the home of a woman where a suspected stalker armed with a rifle was hiding, authorities said.

The three men were lauded as pillars of the Northern York County Regional Police Department, where they had served nearly six decades combined and, a prosecutor said, they were saving the life of the woman and her mother when they walked into the ambush.

Those who know them recalled them as devoted to their communities.

Becker was a star athlete in high school, Baker was a computer forensics investigation specialist and a friend says Emenheiser was a perfectionist who had dreams of opening his own gym complex.

All were fathers, leaving behind wives and eight kids in total.

Emenheiser, 43, had served 20 years on the force after becoming a father at a young age, graduating from York College and serving briefly in the Secret Service, friends said.

He loved working out, once posting a photo of himself with Hulk Hogan in a gym while on vacation in Clearwater, Florida. According to one friend, the two men had logged nearly 10,000 hours in the gym together during the course of their 24-year friendship.

“Isaiah remains the hardest working most selfless man I’ve ever met. He served his community as a police officer and as a detective helping make the place he grew up and loved safer for everyone,” that friend, Cody Bright, said on Facebook.

As a police officer, Emenheiser had a lot of close calls, and had gotten a tattoo of the badge of an officer from the department who had died in the line of duty in 2008, said a friend, Kenneth Kopp.

After a close call, he’d call Kopp.

“He’d say, ‘Boss it wasn’t me, I’m OK,’ and I’d say, ‘Thank God,’” Kopp said.

Kopp said Emenheiser had become like a son to him after Emenheiser started working for his flooring contracting business during college to support his young family.

Emenheiser became proficient at renovating houses and had dreams of opening his own gym complex, Kopp said. Emenheiser was a perfectionist, asked a lot of questions about how to do a project and always had ideas on how to do it better, he said.

Emenheiser “would take the shirt off his back for anybody,” Kopp said, recalling how Emenheiser and his family helped Kopp through a battle with cancer a few years ago.

“I prayed for them, for the Lord to take me and bring Isaiah back because he’s very special to me,” Kopp said.

Becker, 39, had served with the department for 16 years and had been a big name in his hometown of Spring Grove going back to high school, when he was a star athlete for the Rockets in football, baseball and wrestling.

“To know Cody was to know a man of unmatched dedication, grit, and unwavering selflessness,” his former wrestling coaches said in a statement on social media.

One high school football feat remains legendary: Becker intercepted a pass from Chad Henne — who went on to quarterback in the NFL — and returned it for a touchdown.

But he was most accomplished in wrestling.

Becker went on to wrestle at Millersville University, even qualifying for the NCAA’s Division 1 wrestling tournament in 2007. He returned to Spring Grove to mentor wrestlers there, an example of what the coaches say was unmatched humility and selflessness.

Becker loved being a police officer, said Andy Ziegler, a lawyer who grew up with Cody.

“He loved being able to help people. I mean, that was the big thing for him is he knew he was making a difference and he knew that he was helping people,” Ziegler said.

Becker was also the nicest person you were ever going to meet, he said.

Baker, 53, started his career with the Philadelphia Police Department in 2001 and moved to the Northern York County Regional Department in 2004.

“Counting down the days to retirement,” he said with a smile on a computer forensics podcast last year.

On the force, he started as a “street officer” and then became a computer forensics investigation specialist, at least in part because of his aptitude with the office hardware.

“I’ve always been into computers, that’s kind of how everybody’s story starts, I think,” he told the podcast host. “I was the one to set up the Wi-Fi passwords, and when they had a printer issue, ‘call Baker in,’ so I’d come in off the street and fix their printer issues, and that’s kind of how it all began.”

He recalled realizing that he would need training to be a computer forensics investigation specialist in 2007 after getting in hot water with the district attorney for how he copied evidence from a seized computer.

Despite that humble beginning, he eventually became skilled enough to serve as an instructor with the International Association of Computer Investigative Specialists.

Baker was tall — at least 6′4″ — and towered over the Boy Scouts troops he was active with. He loved hunting and fishing: “Anything to get me outdoors is just fantastic for me,” he said on the podcast.

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Follow Marc Levy on X at https://x.com/timelywriter.