Robert Wayne Peregoy, 47, died after suffering a heart attack while driving to work on I-795 in Owings Mills. Michael Patrick Howe died in a hospital room after suffering a stroke in his Carroll County home.

Both men were police officers, and the departments for each ruled that their deaths occurred in the line of duty - Peregoy was heading to court; Howe collapsed after commanding officers to storm a house after a man had killed his wife and then himself. Both men received funerals with police honors and pageantry.

But while a police agency may classify a death as in the line of duty, the pension system and other organizations set up to honor fallen heroes don't always agree, adding layers of unforeseen bureaucracy and heartache to families fighting for benefits and recognition long after the deaths fade from the headlines.

Howe's wife and child receive his full yearly salary from Baltimore County and got stipends from the state and federal government. Howe's name is listed on the county's Officer Down memorial page and is engraved in Washington on the National Law Enforcement Memorial.

Peregoy's wife of 27 years is battling Baltimore City's Fire and Police Employees Retirement System to get more than her allowance of a quarter of her husband's salary and funds from a workman's compensation claim filed with the state. His name is not on the union's board of officers who lost their lives while on the job.

Honoring police officers who were killed while on duty would seem a simple task. And indeed, in most cases, such as when an officer is shot while making an arrest, it is straightforward. But other times the process is fraught with complications. Deciding whether an officer was "on duty," injured in a confrontation, died as a result of pre-existing medical condition or even whether the deceased fits the differing definitions of law enforcement officer, can be a tricky task.

Peregoy, a 13-year veteran of the city force assigned to the Violent Crime Impact Division, suffered a heart attack Dec. 16 while driving to court. Motorists noticed his pickup slowing on the shoulder before it stopped in the median, and a state trooper found him slumped over the wheel. He died at a hospital.

Thomas P. Tannyhill, the executive director of the city police pension board, said a person who dies driving to work would not ordinarily be considered as having died while at work, though it would be different if that person rendered police assistance while driving to work, in effect putting himself "on duty."

The director would not comment on a specific case; Peregoy's is pending and could result in an administrative hearing. The dead officer's wife, Ursula, has hired an attorney who told me he's immersed in a bureaucratic morass trying to decipher rules governing the city pension system and the state workman's compensation board.

For example, the city and state differ on how long an applicant has to serve to be eligible, and what constitutes a work-related injury or death. "It's like night and day," said Ursula Peregoy's attorney, David Love said.

Love said he is trying to say Officer Robert Peregoy died in the line of duty by linking his heart condition to job stress - though he admitted that "it's not easy to prove" - and he has consulted cardiologists. He also said that he will argue Peregoy was "at work" because he was driving to a work-related function - court.

"It's going to be a long process," Love said.

The death of Lt. Michael Howe in August 2008 differs in many ways. Howe's family not only got a full pension from Baltimore County, but also benefits from the state and federal governments. The feds say a police officer's death is considered in the line of duty if it occurs within 24 hours of a police incident, even from natural causes. Howe suffered a stroke at home but within hours of the tense standoff.

"Each jurisdiction has different rules on the books," said Cole B. Weston, the president of the police union representing Baltimore County officers.

Some families get their loved ones recognized on national monuments but don't qualify for death benefits. Others get benefits but no public recognition.

That's what happened to the parents of Grant Turner, a 24-year-old Crofton resident who died in 2005 after collapsing a few minutes after completing a 5K run that doubled as a training exercise for police cadets and a fundraiser for the family of an officer killed on U.S. 50 a year earlier.

Turner, one week shy of graduating from the academy and joining the Maryland Transportation Authority Police and two weeks shy of getting married, apparently had an enlarged heart that no one had noticed. His parents qualified for a full pension, but the board running the National Law Enforcement Memorial refuses to list him as a fallen hero.

The rational: Turner had not yet been sworn as an officer, and one of the requirements is that those honored have full arrest powers.

Turner's 59-year-old father, Philip, spent 26 years as an Annapolis police officer and another six in Anne Arundel County. An ardent supporter of cops, Turner told me he now drives with the memorial flag flying upside down from his motorcycle as a protest.

"No question, my son was giving 150 percent," said Turner, who as a member of the police color guard participated in police funerals across the state. "The night before my son had to do that run, he said, 'Dad, it's going to be hot tomorrow.' I said, 'Son, if it's part of your training, you've got to do what the department says.' He said, 'I'm scared.' "

The fight has left his family drained, bitter and unable to visit the Washington memorial that Turner says should honor his son the way it honors 18,661 other law enforcement officers who have given their lives in service since 1792. It appears that getting on that list can be just as arduous as navigating the pension system.

A spokesman for the memorial, Kevin Morison, said the Names Committee rejected Turner because when he died he could not legally arrest anybody. He noted that most names on the memorial are of officers "who were shot and killed in the line of duty," which makes for clear-cut decisions.

But Morison said in the last 12 years, "more officers have died in traffic-related incidents then from any other cause," and that requires more thorough reviews. He said board members, faced with deaths from natural causes, solicit help from doctors and medical experts to determine "if the physical ailment was a direct result of police activity."

Honoring cops who die is not as easy as it might appear.