A heartwarming clip of police officers showing kindness to a homeless man in Melbourne, Australia, has gone viral after it was uploaded to social media by a woman.
The woman filmed the two officers in front of a grocery store after a complaint was filed about a disturbance in front of the Ashwood Woolworths supermarket on May 30.
The cops arrived and met a homeless man who was very polite. Adele Barbaro, witnessed the whole scene while she was at the store to get groceries and diapers.
She noticed that the officers weren’t telling him off bluntly or forcing him out.
“As the officers approached him, instead of saying ‘time to move on’ or ‘you know you can’t be here’, one of them said, ‘What brings you out in the cold tonight mate?’” Barbaro posted on Facebook.
“I heard him talk about being hungry and the iPads came out as they took details, and as I made my way through the automatic doors I could hear the officers say ‘We just wanna make sure your OK mate?’”
Barbaro said the cops bought him a roasted chicken, bread rolls, milk and other basics, and were up to much good. “That is when it hit me,” Barbaro continued on Facebook.
“They were not shopping for themselves. We ended up at the checkout at the same time, they had split up and seem to do half the groceries each and both pulling out wallets/purses to pay half each.”
“These 2 weren’t rookies, they clearly knew the difference between a scammer and someone who was genuinely hungry. As they went outside I overhead them check again that he had somewhere to stay tonight and then they handed him the bag of food with respect, compassion and kindness.”
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Those two Good Samaritan officers were First Constable Sheridan Jones and Constable Simon Jacobson. They said it was cold out there and that the man hadn’t had a proper meal for 24 hours. He had a bottle of chocolate milk and didn’t know when he’d get another chance to eat.
Jacobson said the man was genuine, and they wanted to help him. “So we just sort of said, ‘What do you like to eat?’ and he said, ‘Don’t get us anything,’” Jones recalled.
“And we just said, ‘Well you can either come in with us and choose something or we’ll surprise you.’” The homeless man chose the latter. The officers started buying items they thought would be useful and the man took the food with a grateful heart.
Jones stressed, though, for all the commendation they’ve received, these small acts of kindness always go on — we just don’t always see them.
“Just want to point out that this is the sort of stuff that members are doing most days of the week and just goes unnoticed,” she said. “And I think it’s just the fact that she (Barbaro) was there at the time we did it that it has sort of shown the public that these are the things that go on as well as the other stuff.”
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