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Ottawa Citizen photographer Ashley Fraser has been nominated for a National Newspaper Award for her photo of police officers overcome with emotion last May as the body of their fallen colleague, Ontario Provincial Police Sgt. Eric Mueller, was brought to a funeral home.

Mueller was one of three officers who responded last May 11 to an early morning disturbance at a home on Laval Street in Bourget, about 50 kilometres east of Ottawa. All three offers were shot, Mueller fatally.

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Fraser took her photo two days after the shooting, when the body of Mueller, a 42-year-old father of two and a police officer for 21 years, was brought to a small funeral home in Rockland, east of Ottawa. The streets of Rockland were lined with hundreds of people paying their respects and an honour guard of about 75 uniformed OPP officers was present.

When the honour guard was dismissed, several officers broke down and began to sob.

“When you think of police officers, you often think of men and women who very rarely show emotion. They are people who run towards danger, who go into the hard situations that the public is typically running away from,” Fraser said about her photo.

“When you see a police officer break down and show emotion, that moment is remarkable.”

Fraser has been a photographer for the Ottawa Citizen for 20 years and was previously nominated for National Newspaper Awards in 2007 and 2017. This year, two other photographers with The Globe and Mail are in the running with Fraser.

The winners in the National Newspaper Awards’ 25 categories are to be announced April 26 at a Toronto gala.

phum@postmedia.com

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