From the Crowd to the Podium: Two Families Confront the Grief They Once Witnessed

For Eileen Cajuso, the number was 191. For David Jaramillo, it was 181.

That is how many days had passed since Mrs. Cajuso learned her husband, Sgt. David A. Cajuso, of the Miami Beach Police Department, died after crashing his patrol motorcycle while on duty, and since Mr. Jaramillo learned that his 27-year-old son, Deputy Devin M. Jaramillo, had been fatally shot by a suspect he was trying to subdue.

On Thursday, May 7, 2026, both grieving relatives gave speeches during the 45th Annual Miami-Dade Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Ceremony at Tropical Park.

About 2,000 people attended the ceremony, nearly half of them dressed in uniform, brothers and sisters in blue, supporting the two families, and paying tribute to the 171 Miami-Dade County officers, deputies, agents and other law enforcement officials who made the ultimate sacrifice.

The relatives of officers killed in the line of duty in Miami-Dade County were escorted from a hospitality tent to their seats Thursday evening in preparation for the start of the ceremony. They sat in the front rows, some clutching flowers, some wearing buttons or T-shirts with their fallen loved one’s name on it. The sound of bagpipes marked the start of the ceremony. There was a procession of 27 flags, each one from a Miami-Dade County law enforcement agency that has in its history an officer killed in the line of duty.

For both speakers, the venue carried familiarity.

In recent years, Eileen Cajuso would load the couple’s three children into her car and drive to the memorial ceremony. David Cajuso would already be there, in his uniform, working near the entrance of the memorial, and his wife and children would stand nearby and keep him company. Eileen Cajuso would listen to the speeches of grieving families, never imagining she would one day stand among them.

“Back then, I stood here as his wife, watching him, and admiring him in his uniform. Today, I stand here as his widow, honoring him,” she said. Grief pressed through her voice as she continued.

“Let me put it this way, I once stood on the edge of someone else’s loss, looking in, and now I’m on the inside living it.”

Devin Jaramillo had followed his father into law enforcement, lateraling from the Coral Gables Police Department to the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office, where his father spent more than three decades before retiring. Throughout his career, David Jaramillo made it a point to attend the annual memorial ceremony at Tropical Park.

“I first stepped on these grounds back in the early ’90s, a dear friend of mine, a partner, Carmen Gonzalez, was killed in the line of duty, Nov. 28, 1993. I stood up here and represented her, to her family, and from that moment on, I came to a lot of these tributes. I witnessed the loss of a lot of colleagues and friends from this department, and other departments, but today … it’s come full circle for me,” David Jaramillo said.

David Cajuso’s and Devin Jaramillo’s names were the 170th and 171st etched into the granite memorial. Four slabs bear the names of every Miami-Dade County law enforcement officer killed in the line of duty since 1895.

“No matter how many years pass, their sacrifice will never fade,” said Aventura Police Department Chief Michael Bentolila, president of the Miami-Dade County Association of Chiefs of Police, during his opening remarks.

“Just as we begin each roll call with Officer Rhett McGregor, who gave his life in 1895, we will continue to honor every name that follows. Time does not diminish their legacy, it strengthens it.”