By Jeremy Peppas
Stephens Media
NORTH LITTLE ROCK — A Salvation Army supervisor who was gunned down on Christmas Eve was remembered today as a man of God who died in the line of duty.
“While we are sad, we celebrate the life of Philip Wise,” Mayor Patrick Hays told about 350 people who attended a memorial service at First Assembly of God for the 40-year-old Salvation Army major.
Wise was shot to death Thursday in front of his three children, ages 4, 6 and 8. Photos of the three and drawings they had done surrounded Wise’s casket during viewing prior to the service.
Police said two men approached Wise as he dropped off the day’s donations at Salvation Army headquarters in the Baring Cross neighborhood, a rough area just west of downtown North Little Rock.
Police have made no arrests in the slaying, which they said occurred during an attempted robbery.
“When you look around the neighborhood where the Salvation Army is, it is a spiritual battleground. Philip Wise became a victim of that war. Evil showed its ugly face,” Bob Cornett, a Salvation Army captain from Wise’s native West Virginia who planned to spend Christmas with the Wise family, said during today’s memorial.
“Wise believed in the redemptive power of Christ,” Cornett added. “By God’s grace and mercy we can move forward. That afternoon, they may have killed him. They can’t touch his spirit, they can’t take his legacy.”
Wise, who lived in Maumelle, was a 15-year veteran of the Salvation Army and served as supervisor of the organization’s North Little Rock, Maumelle and Sherwood operations the past three years.
He was the third Salvation Army officer to die in the line of duty in the organization’s history, said Cindy Fuller, a spokeswoman for the Salvation Army in Arkansas and Oklahoma. The last was a Norwegian Salvation Army colonel who was shot at organization headquarters in Pakistan in September 2007.
Authorities are offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in Wise’s killing.
A funeral service for Wise will be held Saturday in Morgantown, W.Va. He was a native of Weirton, W.Va., where his mother still lives.
