{"id":271638,"date":"2026-04-16T23:59:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T23:59:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/271638\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T23:59:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T23:59:20","slug":"sacramento-sheriff-advocates-for-school-resource-officers-after-fatal-natomas-high-shooting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/271638\/","title":{"rendered":"Sacramento sheriff advocates for school resource officers after fatal Natomas High shooting"},"content":{"rendered":"

(FOX40.COM) \u2014\u00a0Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper is calling for more school resource officers on campus in the wake of the fatal shooting of a teenager<\/a> at Natomas High School.<\/p>\n

Cooper released a statement on social media Thursday morning emphasizing the importance of a law enforcement presence on school campuses.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can have all the conversations we want about policy, philosophy and perception,\u201d he said \u201cBut none of that matters when masked men enter a \u2018secure\u2019 campus and a student is killed. We send our kids to school for 6 to 7 hours a day with the expectation that they are learning, working hard, and striving to build a better future. The last thing any parent should have to worry about is whether their child is safe at school.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cooper pointed to the partnership between the Sacramento County Sheriff\u2019s Office and the Elk Grove Unified School District as a \u201clong-standing, proven model built on trust and coordination.\u201d<\/p>\n

The office is expanding its campus outreach, adding resource officers to Antelope High School.<\/p>\n

Instead of implementing stationary security guards fixed at posts, the deputies on campus build relationships with the entire school community, including students, staff and parents, Cooper said.<\/p>\n

Cooper said that protecting the most vulnerable people should be a society\u2019s main goal, and asked the question, \u201cwho is more important to protect than our children?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOpposing school resource officers might sound good in a school board meeting or on social media, but it does not hold up when real-world violence shows up at a school\u2019s doorstep,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Sacramento County District Attorney, Thien Ho said preventative measures need to be taken.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have two 16-year-olds that brought two loaded handguns onto school campuses in the middle of the day. And we have a shooting,\u201d Ho told FOX40 on Wednesday. \u201cSo we really need to double our efforts of prevention and intervention. But also, how do we get the guns out of the hands of kids?\u201d<\/p>\n

Natomas Unified School District confirmed with FOX40 that they submitted a formal request to the Sacramento city manager to reinstate their school resource officer contract. The district\u2019s previous three-year contract expired at the end of 2025<\/a> and was not renewed due to a police staffing shortage.<\/p>\n

The Sacramento City Manager\u2019s Office said the city and the Sacramento Police Department are working closely as they evaluate the request and determine the most responsible path.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe remain committed to examining changes made throughout the department while maintaining strong partnerships with our local school districts,\u201d the police department said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/p>\n

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to FOX40 News. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(FOX40.COM) \u2014\u00a0Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper is calling for more school resource officers on campus in the wake…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271639,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[117893,916,2726,91318,121,1443,123,122,36071,77858,16000],"class_list":{"0":"post-271638","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sacramento","8":"tag-antelope-high-school","9":"tag-elk-grove-unified-school-district","10":"tag-jim-cooper","11":"tag-natomas-high-school","12":"tag-sacramento","13":"tag-sacramento-city","14":"tag-sacramento-headlines","15":"tag-sacramento-news","16":"tag-school-campuses","17":"tag-school-community","18":"tag-school-resource-officers"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271638"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271638\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271639"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}