Kids sometimes have the tendency of throwing temper tantrums at the most inconvenient times, but when one 4-year-old had a meltdown on his way into school, an Indiana cop, who was there supporting her church community, knew exactly how to deal with it.
Indiana State Police officer Precious-Cornner Jones went to a local elementary school last week to support her pastor, who holds high-five rallies in which members of the community give high-fives to students walking into school to give them inspiration for the day, she told ABC News.
That’s when she saw a little boy with a severe case of the Mondays. When he walked into school, he had a “look” on his face, which more than conveyed that he was not in a “good mood,” she said. Then, a quintessential meltdown began, and the boy collapsed to the floor.
Cornner-Jones spotted the boy’s mother from across the room and signaled to her that she would “deal with” her son, she said. Cornner-Jones is a mother to two young boys herself, ages 3 and 5, and a 17-year-old daughter. That, combined with her volunteer efforts and time spent with her church community, has greatly contributed to her expertise in dealing with children, she said.
The officer got down on the ground and lied down next to the boy, wiping tears from his eyes and asking, “Hey, little man, what’s going on?”
At first, he looked at her, confused, Cornner-Jones said. Within a few minutes, he was smirking back at her.
“It wasn’t a cop moment,” she said. “It was a mother moment.”
In a time of tension between police and the communities they serve, the photo of Cornner-Jones’ act of kindness soon circulated through social media before gaining national attention. She said she’s glad she was able to be part of something “positive.”
“I think people lose sight that these kids are humans, too,” she said, adding that it’s unrealistic to expect children to be “robots” who do “exactly what we say.”
Cornner-Jones said she hopes her story inspires people to “stop” and “show someone some love.”