Congressman Jones remembered as man of integrity

Gov. Roy Cooper and members of North Carolina's congressional delegation attended the funeral at St. Peter Catholic Church in Greenville, and Cooper, who served in the General Assembly with Jones in the late 1980s, delivered one of several eulogies.

"I got to work closely with Walter, and I got to know him as a person who told you what he believed and who kept his word," Cooper said. "He was independent in his thinking and often caused bipartisan angst among political party leaders because of that fierce independence."

Jones "didn't toe any political line but his own," the governor said, noting his former colleague always did what he thought was right for North Carolina and the country.

He gained national attention for his regret in voting for the Iraq War, and he made it his mission to atone for it, signing more than 11,000 letters to families of fallen service members.

"There's no question that he had a special love for those who served," said Jason Lowry, who served as Jones' military liaison for 14 years. "It was one of the most important things to him and really allowed me in that position to be able to help, and when I needed him to be involved in a case or an issue, there was no question that he was there. He was personally involved, personally invested."

Connie Gruber, who lost her Marine husband in an V-22 Osprey crash in 2000, also eulogized Jones, saying he fought to clear her husband's name and show that pilots weren't to blame for the military aircraft's frequent crashes.

"Little did I know how blessed we would be when the one government leader who first stepped forward to help us just happened to have , I say, the backbone of an Army and, when necessary, the stubbornness of a mule," Gruber said, calling Jones "the other hero in my life."

Fr. Justin Kerber, who served as Jones' pastor for more than a decade before moving to Sacred Heart Cathedral in Raleigh, called Jones "a man of absolute integrity."

"Walter cared for all the people God placed in his life," Kerber said during his sermon. "Whether you agreed with him or not, he was faithful."

Jones was a lifelong resident of Farmville in Pitt County, and Kerber said he tried to drive home from Washington, D.C., every weekend and would typically attend Mass on both Saturday evening and Sunday morning.

Cooper hasn't yet set the date for a special election to fill the 3rd Congressional District seat.