COMMENTARY: Amid mourning, San Benito did what it does best: come together

With temperatures resting between the 80s and 90s under a sunny South Texas sky, Friday in San Benito was an otherwise beautiful day that should have been filled with excitement. Neighboring Harlingen was coming to town that night for arguably the biggest high school football game in Texas, the Battle of the Arroyo. Halloween is also right around the corner and families would normally be running to stores to stock up on candy and costumes.

But there was a heaviness Friday that rendered these activities an afterthought.

The 25,000 people in this community were left in a state of shock and grief after Lt. Milton Resendez, a near-30-year veteran of the local police department, was shot and killed during a high-speed pursuit Tuesday evening. He is San Benito’s only police officer killed in the line of duty, bringing immeasurable pain to a city that was already grieving the recent loss of longtime principal and former school board member Bob Tumberlinson.

For these reasons, Friday instead began quietly, somberly, mournfully. It manifested in a law enforcement escort of Resendez’s body from Valley Baptist Medical Center in Harlingen to Buck Ashcraft Funeral Home in San Benito that afternoon, when police agencies from all over South Texas created a miles-long procession in an act of reverence. Hundreds of residents and businesses also lined up on the busiest thoroughfare between the two cities, 77 Sunshine Strip, to pay their respects.

They took video with their cellphones and posted it on their social media pages with various messages of support for the family.

“Such a beautiful thing to see our city come together to pay (their) respects for the family,” Clarissa Guerra said via Facebook.

During a Facebook Live video, Jesus De La Cruz described the scene as “a road full of officers taking slain officer Resendez from Valley Baptist to (the) funeral home in San Benito.”

In that moment, San Benito was every city in America that has lost a police officer while protecting their community, and unfortunately the fourth in the Rio Grande Valley since 2019.

Some say that the city already suffers enough with limited business and infrastructure, not to mention past indignities stretching from longtime political turmoil to scathing depictions in the media.

But as the sun set on Friday, it also set on the sorrow residents incurred all week. Because in the face of grief, San Benito — a community The Brownsville Herald once referred to as the small town with a big heart — did what it does best: come together.

Later that night, a moment of silence was observed for the fallen lieutenant at Bobby Morrow Stadium in San Benito, where Greyhound and Harlingen Cardinal fans gathered for the difficult task of rooting on their teams amid extraordinary grief. Resendez’s picture was displayed on the scoreboard for the occasion, and the thousands who were in attendance — thousands who fuel the most bitter grudge match in all of the state’s rivalries — produced a deafening silence in an emotional moment for all.

“You could have heard a pin drop,” T.J. Tijerina, a longtime firefighter in town who also knew Resendez, said of the moment.

Whether a Greyhound or Cardinal, respect for Resendez came first Friday evening, making everyone in attendance a proud resident of San Benito.

The game then kicked off, and after a hard-fought contest, San Benito emerged victorious. In more ways than one.

At the end of the night, residents who needed something to celebrate took their elation on the road and created their own parade, which Hector and Betsy Avila helped organize, honking down Sam Houston Boulevard — not far from where Resendez was gunned down protecting the same street — and closing a day that began in despair with victory and resilience.

No one made the mistake of thinking the game was more than a game, but everyone understood what it meant for the small town with a big heart.

“It was humanity at its best between both communities,” San Benito High School head football coach Dan Gomez said Saturday, adding that this battle meant more to the team than in years past. “Whenever you lose heroes like that, it hits hard but next door as well. I have two brothers in law enforcement, and definitely we were very sympathetic to the families. And our kids went out there and dedicated the game to the Resendez family.

“The kids take it upon themselves to carry the pride of the community on their backs, and whenever the community celebrates moments like that, I’m very proud of the kids for making that happen.”

Harlingen High School head football coach Manny Gomez was equally as moved as his counterpart in San Benito.

“It was such a profound moment,” he said Sunday of Friday night’s moment of silence, adding his support for the community and expressing his respect for local law enforcement.

Eladio Jaimez, who sits on the Harlingen school board and works for AEP Texas, previously covered both communities during his time at the Valley Morning Star and noted the sibling relationship between the two cities prompting residents north of San Benito to mourn Resendez’s death with them.

In fact, Jaimez recalled speaking to a friend earlier in the week about the Battle of the Arroyo and explained the connection between San Benito and Harlingen being one that’s competitive on Friday nights but caring every other day.

“This week when we lost an officer in San Benito, both towns grieved because there’s a lot of connections between San Benito and Harlingen,” Jaimez said Saturday. “Whether it’s friends or family or coworkers, when something like this happens, it doesn’t surprise me that both communities come together. I know San Benito would have come together to stand with us, because San Benito is not just another city to us and Harlingen is not just another city to San Benito. We’re so close and interconnected that when tragedy strikes, we mourn with each other and stand with each other.

“It’s almost expected that we stand with each other, and speaking for Harlingen and for me, I mourn with them because I know police officers like Lt. Resendez. … The Valley picks each other up whether in sports or in anything else, and I think we saw that in that procession. It’s like yeah, we want to win the game and beat our biggest rival, but there are things that are bigger.”

Editor’s note: This story was updated with additional remarks from Harlingen High School head football coach Manny Gomez on Sunday, Oct. 22, 2023.