BUFFALO - The mother of slain Trooper David Brinkerhoff said she has nothing but compassion for his state police comrades, even if he was killed by friendly fire.

“I want to give them a hug, I want to give them a hug and tell them it's OK,” Karen Howard told WIVB-TV in Buffalo. “They were in a chaotic and confused situation, and they did what they had to do. The friendly fire thing, whoever it is, we forgive you and we'll be there for you.”

Brinkerhoff, 29, was killed Wednesday in a farmhouse on the western flank of the Catskill Mountains as he and six other members of the elite Mobile Response Team entered while searching for 23-year-old Travis Trim, on the run because he had been suspected of shooting another trooper the day before.

Trim is believed to have been killed when troopers shot him once in the head and twice in the chest.

Acting State Police Superintendent Preston Felton said Brinkerhoff likely was killed by shots fired by a fellow trooper.

Brinkerhoff, the third trooper to be shot and killed in the line of duty since March 2006, was shot in the back of the head by a .223 tactical round.

Brinkerhoff's funeral is slated for Wednesday in the Albany area, and he will be buried in Coxsackie, just south of Albany. The family will hold a memorial for Brinkerhoff on Friday at Wesleyan Church in the Buffalo suburb of Hamburg.

“He loved his job,” Howard said. “We all have risks. You never know what's going to happen, so you live each day to its fullest.”