
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, September 12, 1995                   TAG: 9509120061
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-3   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN AND ROBERT FREIS
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

OFFICER LAUDED AS MAN WHO MADE A DIFFERENCE

R. Lynn Roach, the state police special agent who died in a weekend motorcycle accident, was a good friend, a father and an dedicated crime fighter, a colleague said.

"He made a tremendous difference in my life and in the community," said Donnie Goodman.

Roach, a former Christiansburg police officer who was coordinating the Montgomery County Drug Task Force, was killed Sunday when his motorcycle crashed on Virginia 40 in Franklin County.

"He was the one that was instrumental in bringing this task force up," said Goodman, a Blacksburg police sergeant who had worked with Roach for the past five years. "Lynn was a very smart man who would just amaze me at times. ... Lynn didn't have many idle moments. He was always thinking."

Roach, 40, of Roanoke, is survived by his wife, Mary, and two daughters. In his spare time he coached a little league basketball team and played in an adult baseball league. "He had the kind of life a lot of people would like to have," Goodman said.

A second-generation police officer whose father, Danny, was chief of police in Blacksburg, Roach was a graduate of New River Community College and the Virginia State Police Academy.

He was traveling with a group of cyclists when he lost control of his Harley-Davidson and crashed into a pickup truck near Endicott. He died at Franklin Memorial Hospital about 90 minutes after the 2:30 p.m. crash.

A funeral will be held at 1 p.m. Thursday at the Cave Spring Baptist Church. The family will be at the Oakey's South Chapel from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Wednesday.

by CNB