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John M. O'Quinn, who died at age 68 in an automobile accident in Houston on Oct. 29, was called a hero, a devoted friend, a complicated man and a champion of people in need at his funeral today in Houston.
O'Quinn's pastor, Rev. Ed Young of Second Baptist Church, asked the more than 2,000 people who attended the funeral to pray for O'Quinn and described him as a man of "overwhelming contradictions" who fought many battles for himself and others during his life.
Gerald Treece, whose friendship with O'Quinn dates back to when they were in law school together at the University of Houston Law Center, told the mourners that O'Quinn was "a man bigger than life" whose friendships extended far outside the Texas legal community. Treece, a professor at South Texas College of Law, noted that O'Quinn had conquered the "monster of alcoholism" more than a decade ago, but he was still fighting the "monster of low self-esteem," despite his tremendous success as a trial lawyer. Treece noted that O'Quinn had found happiness during the last decade of his life.
An emotional Michelle Coopwood, daughter of O'Quinn's longtime girlfriend, Darla Lexington, called O'Quinn a hero.
"He showed courage when faced with life's deepest challenges. John was not afraid to do what needed to be done," Coopwood said during the funeral service that lasted more than an hour on a brilliantly sunny day in Houston.
Coopwood said O'Quinn had a great sense of humor, was kind, generous, passionate, silly and zany.
"He was a force of nature. In his path, things moved. He was on fire with the possibilities that something was about to happen," she said. "The world is also suffering from the loss of a great man who had so much more to do on this earth."
O'Quinn and Johnny Cutliff, an employee of his 17-lawyer plaintiffs firm, the O'Quinn Law Firm, died when the car O'Quinn was driving crossed a median on Allen Parkway and crashed into a tree.
The crowd of mourners included many Houston lawyers and judges. During the service, a large photograph of O'Quinn was beamed onto a screen in the front of the large sanctuary.
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