Fallen Boston firefighter Justin Poitras was a hero in life and a hero in death.
The 31-year-old former Marine whose smile lit up a room died on July 4, a day after he was injured in a motorcycle crash in Dorchester. His organs, his family said, were donated and saved the lives of six people.
“Even at the very end, donating his organs to six people, he was always giving to others,” Father John Unni told the packed congregation who came to say goodbye to Justin at yesterday’s funeral Mass at St. Rita Church in Lowell.
Justin’s father, Mark, told Father Unni his son “was someone who would put his life on the line for others.”
Firefighters from Boston and Lowell, where his brother Joshua is a firefighter, filled the parish.