A Utah police officer is being celebrated for babysitting a little girl outside a courtroom and letting her fall asleep as she waited for her father to finish his court appearance.
Surveillance video released by the Orem Police Department on Monday showed Officer Kevin Norris seated outside an Orem courtroom waiting to testify at a recent hearing. While Norris waits, a little girl could be seen playing around the room until her father tried to bring her in to the courtroom.
But, according to police, the girl wasn’t allowed in the courtroom and soon came back to the lobby to play.
“You can tell that Officer Norris is a father first and police officer second!” the police department wrote on Facebook.
Officer Norris quickly took the girl, named Abi Moncayo according to KUTV, under his wing and the pair went for a stroll. Shortly after, they found themselves seated and watching cartoons together.
Within moments, Moncayo was fast asleep.
Reaction to the footage has been very positive. Mark Bird, a police officer in London, England, wrote on Facebook that cops “look after people in any circumstances” and “this officer is a great example of policing.”
“This is just one of the reasons why I love working for ORPD. Great men and women with huge hearts,” colleague Greer Haymond wrote. “Proud to serve along side you Kevin Norris.”
“I love that obviously her parents haven’t taught her to be afraid of the police and she was comfortable enough to fall asleep,” Sunny Graves point out in a Facebook comment.
Norris, meanwhile, is taking the reaction in stride.
“We’re not just officers who are out there to arrest people,” Norris told KUTV. “We’re out there to make our community a better place.”
Footage of the encounter has been watched on Facebook more than two million times and shared by over 17,000 people.
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