Commentary

Rutherford County, Tennessee, Sherriff's Office School Resource Officers Cody Didier and Jeremy Gregory got an Auto Zone store to donate an alternator, helped make the repairs, and filled the student's gas tank. (anon-tae - iStock image / Getty Images)

Police Officers Help Fix Homeless Boy's Van as 'Defund Police Activists' Strangely Unavailable

By Connor Cavanaugh March 30, 2024 at 2:05pm

While the news media buzz about cops being brutal killers who victimize the poor, a pair of school resource officers reminded everybody that perhaps the media is sensationalizing things.

Back in January, it came to the attention of a high school in La Vergne, Tennessee, that one of their students was homeless, living inside of his van.

A coordinator with the district’s ATLAS program, which serves “families in transition,” assisted in helping the 17-year-old student find shelter, but because the van the youth drove was broken, he wasn’t able to get to the new location.

That’s where School Resource Officers Cody Didier and Jeremy Gregory stepped in, going above and beyond to serve their community.

The pair contacted an Auto Zone store manager, who donated an alternator. They helped some other students make the repairs. They even dug into their own wallets to send the student on his way with a full tank of gas, according to KAKE-TV.

The Rutherford County Sheriff’s Office made a Facebook post applauding the two officers for their outstanding work.

“SRO Didier and SRO Gregory went beyond their duty to ensure a student could get to a shelter and back to school every day,” Sgt. John Acton said.

Is media coverage of local law enforcement biased?

“Their types of actions represent the true definition of what it is to be a school resource officer in the Rutherford County Sheriff’s SRO Division,” he added.

Working as an officer — even a school resource officer — is a tough job.

A 2022 poll from Gallup found that the general public is slowly losing confidence in the police as an institution.

Undoubtedly, the overreporting of cases where police have to use physical force on suspects and the Black Lives Matter movement has weighed heavily on its public image.

But in many ways, this shifting perception is unfair to the average officer.

Of course, there will always be bad apples within any organization — the idea that there can be any group of people that are perfectly fit for their position is entirely unreasonable.

However, pointing to a small minority and claiming that it represents the larger picture is unfair and intentionally deceitful.

There’s a reason those stories get a massive amount of attention — it’s because they’re flashy and confirm the bias of those who already dislike the police.

The news doesn’t portray reality, though.

Every day, there are hundreds of thousands of individuals who go out to serve their community the best they can.

It’s unreasonable to claim that the whole law enforcement system is evil because there are a few instances of police acting badly.

For every rogue cop, there are thousands of officers like Didier and Gregory putting good out into the world.

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