CHAMPAIGN — Christopher Oberheim was a quiet guy. He spent his days coaching his daughters’ softball teams, mowing his lawn and spending time with his family.
His nights were spent as a police officer, working in Decatur for seven years, and in Champaign for 13 years, until May 2021, when he was shot and killed while responding to a call for help.
Between Neil Street and Chestnut Street in Champaign, University Avenue is named Honorary Christopher Oberheim Way. The designation, made in 2021, recognizes the sacrifices of a man who is lovingly remembered as a father, husband and protector.
‘The best girl dad ever’
Amber Oberheim said she and Chris met in 1998 at Decatur Memorial Hospital where he worked security and where she was a nurse. He would give her rides to her car or walk her out if it was raining.
“And finally one day I was like, ‘Okay this guy is never going to ask me for my number,’” Amber said. “So I just gave it to him.”
She said they saw each other every day after that.
The couple’s first daughter, Hannah, was born in October 1999. They got married on Dec. 29, 2001. Their second daughter, Avery, followed in December 2002, with twin girls, Addison and Aubree, arriving in June 2007.
Amber said Hannah, Avery and Aubree all played softball growing up, following in Chris’ footsteps.
Chris spent a lot of time coaching and not a lot of time sleeping, according to Avery.
He would sometimes work night patrol, meet his family at a softball tournament the next morning, coach all day and then work the following night shift.
And he never gave his kids any special handouts, according to Hannah.
“Most people think, ‘You don’t want to be the coach’s kid because you get put in first,’” Hannah said. “That was not him at all. I was the first to sit the bench.”
Chris knew when to joke around and when to get serious with the team. His players respected him.
“I feel like they were able to see that he wasn’t this giant muscular, intimidating man. He actually was a teddy bear,” Avery said.
Chris and Addison had a different relationship apart from his other girls. They would go on long drives listening to music, go to the gym and go hunting. And they’d spend their Friday nights at the dirt track in Farmer City.
“Whatever he wanted to do, I was down to go and do it with him,” Addison said. “He was… literally the best girl dad, ever.”
Chris also loved his yard.
“He would pull out of the driveway on a regular basis when it looked good,” Amber said. “And he would be like, ‘Look at that grass. That’s nice grass.’”
A career in public service
Chris started his policing career in the Decatur Police Department in 2000 and transferred to the Champaign Police Department in 2008.
During his time as a patrol officer, he was a cherished member of every team he was a part of, according to Champaign Police Department’s Deputy Chief Greg Manzana, who worked with Chris on SWAT for a few years and later became his lieutenant.
“You don’t earn two medals of valor without having something intrinsically awesome about you,” Manzana said. “If you were going into trouble, that’s a guy that you wanted with you.”
Chris was also a field training officer, working with new officers when they came into the department.
Amber remembers asking him if he wanted to take the sergeant’s test or move to a day shift if it opened up.
“And he would say, ‘No, it’s a different job on day shift,’” Amber said.
Chris was very humble, in every sense of the word, she said. Amber recalls when Chris won awards at the department, they would argue about attending the ceremonies.
“He’d just say, ‘Ah, they’ll stick it in my mailbox,’” Amber said. “I got him to go one time. The other time, I distinctly remember arguing with him. But one of the girls had a game, so he was like, ‘Nope, we’re going to the game.’”
Whether it was coaching his girls on the softball field or doing his job on night patrol, Amber said it was all for his family: “He wanted to serve others and then he wanted to get back here to us.”
Even at work, his girls were his pride and joy.
“That was pretty much all he would talk about, especially their softball careers and him coaching them,” Manzana said.
Avery said she loves hearing the other police officers recall stories Chris used to tell.
“He wasn’t telling them just like, ‘Yeah, I’ve got four daughters,’” Avery said. “‘He was telling people our lives, and what we had going on.’”
The ultimate sacrifice
In the pre-dawn hours of May 19, 2021, Officers Oberheim and Creel responded to a domestic disturbance call. Within seconds, a man on the scene pulled out a gun and shot both officers, fatally wounding Chris.
Deputy Chief Manzana remembers waking to a phone call and being told that two officers were down in a shooting. He said after that, it was all a blur.
“I had to change my cellphone ringer after that,” Manzana said. “I didn’t realize it for months, that tone gets me every time now.”
Amber said she got a knock on her door around 4 a.m. and was told Chris had been shot. As soon as she got to the hospital, the waiting room was packed: She saw officers from Decatur that Chris had worked with, officers from Champaign, and some of his family members.
Chris was already in the operating room when she got there. Amber said she never got to see him.
Amber said she started asking questions and a trauma resident told her where the bullet had entered and that it had not exited.
Within about 30 minutes, Amber said the neurosurgeon broke the news to everyone that Chris had not survived.
She didn’t know what to do.
“And it was at that point in time that I remember just repeating over and over, ‘Somebody say something that makes sense because this doesn’t make any sense to me,’” Amber said.
Amber said she started to get angry. Soon after, one of Chris’ brothers suggested she go home and tell the girls. And that made sense to her.
Looking back, Amber said telling her daughters about their father was the worst moment of her life.
“I felt like, ‘This is just not fair,’” Amber said. “How is it fair that I have to go home and break these girls’ hearts? He was just going to work. He was just doing his job.”
After that, she said everything went from 0 to 100. According to the girls, the story was on the news later that morning. Their phones were blowing up from concerned friends and family, and people started coming over.
Amber sat the girls down and asked what they wanted to do: kick everyone out or let them stay. Hannah said it was an easy answer for her, because she didn’t want to be alone.
People were in and out of their house all day, and at around 4 p.m., a prayer vigil had been organized for them.
“We had like half the town of Monticello on our front lawn,” Hannah said.
Shortly after, Amber and her daughters felt like they needed to make this tragedy mean something.
“Chris’s life was cut short and that needed to be for some reason,” Amber said. “So we decided we were going to create a nonprofit and we named it Peacemaker Project 703.”
Amber was advised to start a GoFundMe before someone else tried to capitalize on the situation. So they agreed. The money raised from the GoFundMe was put into the Peacemaker Project 703, an organization dedicated to supporting law enforcement officers and their families.
The group has hosted and participated in several events honoring fallen officers and supporting current law enforcement officers and their families. The project is currently on hold.
According to Amber and her daughters, the $270,000 raised from the GoFundMe, in addition to other funds raised, is sitting in a bank account untouched.
“All the donations… haven’t even come to us, we put those towards the project,” Hannah said, noting that the family has received hateful accusations on social media about how the funds have been used. “We would give it all back just to have my dad back.”
“Oh yeah,” Amber added. “If we had to live in a cardboard box on the sidewalk somewhere, it would be an instant decision. We would look at each other and all say ‘yes’ unanimously.”
Amber said she and her daughters have grown much closer despite all the turmoil of the past few years.
Honored for his sacrifice
The Champaign Police Department officials memorialized Chris by naming their briefing room after him: The Oberheim Briefing Room.
“This is where he spent the start of every single shift,” Manzana said. “We have a seat here for him along with Bobby Tatman and Tom Dodsworth there. It’s our way of recognizing him and recognizing that loss everyday.”
Chris’ locker was removed from the locker room and placed on the left side of the briefing room, opposite the chairs memorializing all three fallen officers. His uniform, photos and medals are encased in glass and the locker is engraved with his badge and date of passing.
The Champaign Police Department also added a third star to their uniforms — one for each of the three fallen officers in the department’s history.
The city of Champaign also dedicated an honorary street to Oberheim. Most honorary signs are designated for a period of 10 years; police officers’ terms are indefinite.
Amber and the girls said they have mixed feelings about the dedicated street sign.
“We’re very appreciative of the sign,” Amber said. “Would he want that? Probably he wouldn’t. But he didn’t want that recognition.”
Chris’ family wants the community to remember who he truly was – a husband, a father, a brother, a son, a protector – and not define him by the last seven and a half seconds of his life.
“He died as a police officer but he lived as a father,” Avery said.
Five years later and ‘it hurts the exact same’
“I tell myself, ‘In five years, it won’t hurt; In 10 years, it won’t hurt; In 15 years, it’s not going to hurt,’” Avery said. “Here we are at five years and it hurts the exact same.”
Amber said that this year in particular, she’s noticed her physical reactions taking over.
“My brain can’t keep my body from responding and being tense and kind of anxious,” she said. “My stomach is off and I don’t know. It’s stupid but that’s the way it is.”
Amber said she’d tried several times to get Chris out of law enforcement, but it never worked: “It’s in his blood to protect people. And I think as a protector, he excelled.”
At the same time, Chris was so much more than just a police officer — and Amber and her daughters want to make sure he’s remembered for all that he was.
Hannah said that as the weather gets warmer, landscaping starts again and police week comes around, those feelings come right back. And now that she has two sons herself, she feels extra emotional, like another layer of grief she wasn’t expecting.
“I will one day, when they’re old enough, explain him to them,” Hannah said. “It’s not going to be him as a police officer or how he died. It will be a lot more than that.”
Each of the girls echoed similar sentiments.
“He was so much more than that,” Addison said. “There was so much more to him than just showing up to work and putting on a uniform.”
Following in their parents’ footsteps, all four of Chris and Amber’s daughters are going into fields of service.
“We feel very fortunate to have had him for the years that we did,” Amber said. “We wish that there were more of them. But we’re a pretty faithful group of gals that knows that one of these days we’ll get to see him again.”