Those who loved Dontae Melton Jr. remember him as man defined by far more than the battles in his mind.

The 31 year-old wrestled with mental health challenges for much of his adult life. He was also loving, hardworking and frequently silly, a father and son devoted to family.

Melton died June 25 just hours after one of his mental crises ended with him shackled in Baltimore Police custody, unconscious and in desperate need of medical attention. He was one of three people to die in a span of less than two weeks during interactions with Baltimore Police.

When close to 200 family, co-workers and friends came together Saturday at DreamLife Worship Center in Randallstown for Melton’s funeral, a somber mood was often broken by celebrations of life. Attendees sang, clapped and raised hallelujahs.

They also insisted that no one should go through this again.

Nearly half the people in the country will meet criteria for a diagnosable mental health challenge at some point in their lives, Pastor Markus McAllister said, rattling off health statistics during his eulogy.

Some may be better than others at hiding their struggles, the pastor preached, but we have far too many resources and too many smart leaders for people to die the way Melton did last month.

“Because, regardless of the fact of the issues and the challenges that he had, he was still a son,” the pastor said. “He was still a father. He was still an uncle. He was still a nephew. He was still a grandson. He was still a Black man.”

For Melton’s mother, Eleshiea Goode, a licensed clinician, her son’s death is all the more tragic because of how well he’d been doing.

For over a year, Melton had held down a job at the medical waste incinerator in Curtis Bay. (A large group of colleagues from the incinerator attended Saturday’s ceremony, bringing cards and a collections box for Goode). He’d saved money and bought a used car — a big step in the right direction, she said.

Still, Goode knew her son was struggling. He’d been diagnosed with nonspecific mood disorder close to 10 years ago, and in the days leading up to his death things were off.

She went to the courthouse to get a protective order, but officials were unable to find him so couldn’t serve him. A week later, she was in court, pleading tearfully for an emergency petition to protect her son. The judge denied the request, citing Melton’s struggles with substance abuse.

Barely a day later, Melton was dead.

He’d approached a Baltimore Police car in West Baltimore on the evening of June 24, apparently in the middle of a mental health episode. Police restrained him with handcuffs and leg shackles. At some point, he lost consciousness.

Police called for medical support, but their emergency dispatch system failed and help never arrived. Officers transported him to a hospital nearly an hour after the encounter began.

While Melton wrestled internally, family members said, he was always the one to make others smile.

When he was 6 years old, his father, Dontae Melton Sr., took him to see “Space Jam.” Melton jumped with excitement the whole ride to the theater and again once the movie began, his father recalled during Saturday’s service.

When a couple walked into the theater, Melton Sr. tried to settle his son down. The couple, though, joined in, jumping alongside him.

Kaila Thomas said she and her older brother were always tight, and in the seven months before his death they were “thick and thin.” The two were living together in Arundel Mills and often cooked for one another. They always observed Taco Tuesday.

One day after Thomas had prepared tacos for the both of them, she came into the kitchen and found an empty pan in the sink. She texted Dontae: Did you eat it all?

“Is a fat baby heavy?” he texted back.

Melton’s death in police custody has sparked renewed scrutiny on the way Baltimore police officers handle mental health emergencies.

In recent weeks, police have also fatally shot two people in West Baltimore.

On June 17, 36 year-old Bilal “BJ” Abdullah, one of the last in a dying tradition of Baltimore arabbers, was killed by police after firing a gun at officers. On the day Melton died, police kicked down the door of a 70-year-old woman, allegedly wielding a knife in the middle of a mental health crisis, and she died from gunshots sustained in the confrontation.

“We just want change so that this doesn’t continue to happen,” said Tanya Dozier, a friend of Melton’s family for close to 30 years. “Lives are being cut short.”

During the eulogy, McAllister quoted the police dispatch audio from the confrontation, in which an officer can be heard saying Melton was pulling on his doors asking for help. “But he doesn’t look like he needs help,” the officer said.

“He doesn’t look like he needs help, even though he said he needs help,” the pastor responded. “He doesn’t look that way, so I am going to ignore it, because of lack of training, lack of empathy, lack of understanding.”

Outside the service, Goode said she’s trying to make sense of it. She has lots of questions.

Why did the police’s emergency dispatch system fail? What’s BPD’s backup option? Could an officer have gone to a nearby fire station for help? Could someone have just made a phone call?

Goode worked hard to keep Melton on the right track.

Twenty years ago, the mother and son were featured in a Baltimore Sun story in which she described signing Melton up for free tutoring services to make sure he focused on school. Later, she took a job at Forest Park High School, where Melton graduated in 2011, to keep an eye on him.

She remembered him Saturday as an amazing father and son.

“He was a human being, and he deserved to be treated with respect,” she said. “And, based on them leaving him on the pavement there to die, he was not treated with the respect he deserved.”

Spokespeople for Mayor Brandon Scott’s office and Baltimore Police did not respond Saturday to requests for comment.

The Baltimore Police Department has yet to release the names of the officers involved in Melton’s death. The Maryland Attorney General’s Office is investigating.

Since her son’s death, Goode hasn’t heard anything from the mayor’s office, City Hall or the police department. Still, she said she’s been impressed by Scott’s love for Baltimore and attention to issues like this one.

“I believe in him,” she said. “I just need him to do what I know he knows how to do.”

Next to Goode, Melton’s 13-year-old son, Jadon, wore a necklace with a picture of himself with his father, the two of them wreathed in angel’s wings.

In a letter included in the funeral program, Jadon wrote that he’ll miss walks with his father to the store, their “small talks” whenever he got into trouble and goofing off while playing Xbox.

“My day will come when I will be big like you, strong like you brave like you, loving like you and one day, even a dad, loving my son like you!” the 13-year-old wrote to his father.

“We grew up together,” he went on. “We were both so small. We were like best friends, and in my eyes you were perfect through it all.”