A school resource officer in Alabama is being praised for his heroic efforts to save a baby’s life during a middle school basketball tournament earlier this month.
Albertville High School Principal Jordan Phillips said:
“I’ve known Officer Bearden for the last 20 years. He was a former student of mine at Crossville High School when I taught there. I’m just proud of the guy and everything he does for our school. It just shows you how education is so small as a community. We’ve come full circle to where he was my student and now we work together.”
Bearden was just performing his job as usual until a woman ran up to him panicking that her baby wasn’t breathing.
“I look up and a lady is just running from the bleachers, holding her baby out in front of her,” Bearden said. “She’s saying, ‘He’s not breathing, he’s not breathing.’ I don’t know if dad mode… cop mode… first responder mode kicked in, but I took him from her and flipped him over, started some back blows, tilted him down.”
Eventually, the CPR worked and the baby began to breath again. “I heard a little cough, and then he started crying and I said if ‘We’re crying, we’re breathing!’” exclaimed Bearden.“I’ve done adult and senior CPR, but not on a kid… that was a first,” said Bearden.
Bearden is also a father of two and said he relied on his instinct to help save the situation. “The police and our fire guys — we co-train and do joint training together as far as CPR, first aid, and other things like that,” he stated. “I think as a dad you kind of, in your mind, know that you might have to do it… so I just did what I was trained to do.”
“I think it shows what the job is really about,” Phillips commended the resource officer. “Police sometimes get a bad rep and unrightfully so, and those guys are here to serve and protect. Officer Bearden showed that.”
“I think the role we play in the school environment is crucial,” Bearden said. “I think what we do every day is almost as important as, maybe CPR, or anything. I don’t like the spotlight. Some people have called me and said you’re my hero… and I’m like no man. It’s just — the kids call it “the ick” nowadays. I’m just trying to shine a good light on the police and what we do every day.”
Bearden told WHNT that he has been in contact with the family of the baby, and that the young child was released from the hospital earlier this month and is in good condition.
Many over the past couple of years have called to defund the police and scale back policing efforts. Not only would that make society a more dangerous place, but it would hinder the ability for lives to be saved like we have seen here. Bearden demonstrates the importance of our police and first responders, we truly rely on them for much of our safety and protection in society.
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