While the world can often feel like a discouraging place, there are plenty of people – both those who have sworn to protect and serve, as well as regular citizens – who are willing to go above and beyond for others. 

Here are some examples of law enforcement officers and good Samaritans taking heroic action over the past year. 

Arkansas police officer saves boy who fell through ice on pond

Last January, a police officer in Jonesboro, Arkansas, sprang into lifesaving action after a boy fell through the ice on a frozen pond. 

Body camera footage shared by the department showed Officer Troy Ellison running through the snow and jumping a fence before getting on his hands and knees to help the boy. 

HERO POLICE OFFICER SAVES TERRIFIED BOY FROM FROZEN POND

“I gotcha, I gotcha,” he is heard saying in the footage. 

Soon after, another officer and a fire official arrived and helped Ellison pull the boy out of the pond with a rope. 

The boy was taken to a hospital to be checked for any cold weather injuries. 

“’Great Job’ goes to one of our officers who responded to a call about a child falling through ice on a local pond,” a Facebook post from the Jonesboro Police Department, who shared the video, read. 

“Officer Troy Ellison sprung into action when he arrived on the scene. He quickly located the child, crawled onto the ice, and pulled the child to safety with the help of Lt. Shon Morris and members of the Jonesboro Fire Department.”

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Arizona officers save baby being held hostage

In May, a team of officers in Surprise, Arizona, entered a barricaded home where a 7-month-old baby was allegedly being held hostage by his father and had been shot. 

“I thought that one of us or multiple of us would get hurt going inside the house,” Surprise Officer Carlton Williams told “FOX News @ Night” in October. “The fact that the gentleman had already shot at officers multiple times, there was no doubt in my mind that we had to make entry into the home.”

The department had received a 911 call about a woman and her baby being held hostage by the baby’s father. The mother escaped, but the child was still inside when the team of officers forced their way in after hearing gunfire. 

They found the baby at the back of the house and one officer took him to safety while the others provided cover – all without firing any shots.

The baby was taken to a hospital to recover and was reunited with his mother. The father later died after barricading himself in the home and lighting it on fire. 

“This is as close as it gets to a perfect operation,” law enforcement expert Aaron Cohen said. “They’ve got to get to the end of that structure and get to that kid, and they have no idea what’s laying behind that door.”

ARIZONA BODYCAM HEROES SAVE WOUNDED BABY BEING HELD HOSTAGE INSIDE HOUSE

California police officer saves choking boy

In June, a police officer in El Monte, California, saved the life of an 8-year-old boy who had fallen unconscious after choking on a piece of candy. 

“I just saw him purple, he was already unconscious, so… neighbors and I were trying to do compressions on his chest, breathe through his mouth, but nothing seemed to be working,” the boy’s mother, Vanessa Becerra-Aguayo, told “Fox News @ Night.” “He was unable to talk to me, so he was unconscious the whole time until the police arrived.” 

Officer Raul Vega said he used his LifeVac “anti-choking, rescue device” to clear the boy’s airway. 

“It’s basically like a plunger, like a foam plunger, and you place the device over the person’s mouth, and you press to get, you know, suction in and while you’re holding it down, you pull it up, and that allows the object to become dislodged and the airway to open up,” he said. 

After two tries, the candy came out of the boy’s throat, and he later woke up in the ambulance. 

HEROIC POLICE OFFICER SAVES CHILD CHOKING ON CANDY: HE WAS ‘PURPLE’

Indiana police officer saves boy with autism from drowning in pool 

In September, an Indiana police officer was hailed as a hero after he saved a 3-year-old boy with autism from drowning in a neighbor’s pool.

After responding to a report that the boy was missing when his parents realized the door had been left unlocked and he had gotten out of the home, Fort Wayne Police Officer Evan Myers began to search the area with other officers. 

After seeing the boy swimming in the neighbor’s above-ground pool, he ran over and got the boy out. 

“He’s breathing and is conscious,” Myers is heard saying in body camera footage. “Are you OK, buddy?”

“I want to personally thank him deeply for just being able to find my son,” the boy’s mom, Savannah Ybarra, told local station WPTA.

WATCH: HERO INDIANA OFFICER SAVES MISSING AUTISTIC BOY, 3, FROM DROWNING IN POOL

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Georgia passerby saves homeowner from house fire 

In October, a passerby saved a Winterville, Georgia, homeowner who woke up from a nap to find his house engulfed in smoke and flames. 

David McConnell told FOX5 Atlanta he could hardly see and he tried to leave his house through his front door but his storm door – a secondary door installed over the door – was locked. 

Dylan Betts, who was driving home from work when he saw the smoke, raced to McConnell’s house and “ripped it off and then kicked it in,” he said. 

Betts said he stepped inside the home through a “thick wall of black smoke” and called out.

GEORGIA PASSERBY SAVES MAN FROM BURNING HOME BY KICKING DOWN STORM DOOR

David McConnell’s house went up in flames on Oct. 29. (Athens-Clarke County Fire Department)

“Mr. David, luckily, heard my voice, and he came right to me,” Betts told FOX5. 

When the outlet asked Betts why he risked his life to save a stranger, Betts responded, “Why not? That’s America.”

McConnell said his family calls Betts “our hero,” and even gave Betts tickets to a Georgia/Tennessee football game as a small thank you for saving his life.

Oklahoma police officer and good Samaritan save sleeping man from rolling off bridge

In November, a quick-thinking police officer and a good Samaritan teamed up to save a man who said he fell asleep on a guardrail of a bridge about 40 feet over the Oklahoma River. 

An Oklahoma City police officer identified as Officer Reyes went to check on the sleeping man lying on the bridge’s guardrail when the man turned and slipped. 

Reyes grabbed the man by his hoodie as he dangled over the waters below.

SLEEPING MAN SAVED FROM ROLLING OFF BRIDGE BY POLICE OFFICER, GOOD SAMARITAN IN DRAMATIC VIDEO 

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A good Samaritan jogger then ran over to help Reyes grab the man’s arms and pull him to safety. 

The man wasn’t hurt in the incident. 

Oklahoma City Police Msgt. Gary Knight told News9, “It’s a real hero type thing when you see an officer spring into action – save someone’s life with the help of a citizen.” 

Fox News’ Michael Dorgan, Maria Lencki, Sarah Rumpf-Whitten and Stephen Sorace contributed to this report. 

A former federal prosecutor in the case that sent a man to death row says it is difficult to see a “remorseless murderer” be relieved of his sentence following President Biden’s decision on Monday to commute nearly all federal inmates facing execution.

Brandon Council, of North Carolina, was sentenced to death by a federal jury on Oct. 3, 2019, after he was found guilty of killing two women who worked at a South Carolina bank during a robbery in 2017. 

Council was one of the 37 convicted murderers who will now spend life in prison without parole after Biden reclassified their death sentences.

Derek Shoemake, former assistant U.S. attorney for the District of South Carolina and one of the federal prosecutors in the case against Council, told Fox News Digital it was “one of the greatest professional honors” of his life to pursue justice for victims Donna Major, 59, and Kathryn Skeen, 36, and his heart aches for their families following Biden’s decision.

BIDEN COMMUTES SENTENCES OF 37 FEDERAL DEATH ROW INMATES IN FINAL MONTH OF PRESIDENCY

“Donna and Katie were amazing women, wonderful mothers, and beacons of light in their community. Today my thoughts and prayers are with their families, and my heart aches for them as they process this news,” Shoemake said in a statement.

He also said his thoughts and prayers are with the team who “worked for more than a year” getting justice for Major and Skeen, “ensuring a remorseless murderer received a sentence that spoke to the horrific nature of his senseless crimes.”

Brandon Council is one of 37 federal death row inmates who escaped execution following President Biden’s decision to commute their sentences. (DeathPenaltyInfo.org)

Council entered CresCom Bank in Conway, South Carolina, on Aug. 21, 2017, with the intention of robbing the business and killing its employees, according to a 2017 news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of South Carolina (USAO-SC).

After making it inside, Council shot Major, who was the bank teller, multiple times with a revolver, the USAO-SC said at the time. He then ran into Skeen’s office, where she worked as the bank’s manager, and shot her multiple times while she hid under her desk. 

Before fleeing the bank, he stole keys to both victims’ cars, their bank cards and more than $15,000 in cash. He took one of the vehicles to a motel he was staying at, packed his luggage and drove off.

FBI AGENT SAYS BANK ROBBERY SUSPECT BRANDON COUNCIL CONFESSED HE WOULD KILL

“It is difficult to see a sentence wiped away from 400 miles away after it was legally imposed by a jury of men and women from South Carolina who spent weeks listening to evidence, deliberating, and carefully deciding the appropriate punishment,” Shoemake said.

He also said it hurts that the victims’ families “will celebrate yet another Christmas without their loved ones,” while Council is among the 37 federally convicted murderers “celebrating a political victory.”

BIDEN’S DECISION TO COMMUTE SENTENCES FOR DEATH ROW INMATES SPARKS SOCIAL MEDIA FRENZY

Most federal death row inmates were housed at the federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Indiana. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy, File)

Shoemake said his focus is not on the political debate surrounding Biden’s commutations, but on the “legacy of love, family, and faith” that Major and Skeen embodied.

“I pray for their families, as I so often do, and I pray for all the victims’ families impacted today,” he said.

In a White House statement announcing the commutations on Monday, Biden said he condemns the murderers and their “despicable acts,” and he grieves for the victims and families who have suffered “unimaginable and irreparable loss,” but he “cannot stand back and let a new administration resume executions that I halted.”

President Biden commuted the sentences of 37 of the 40 convicted murderers on federal death row, converting their punishments to life imprisonment. He left Tree of Life Synagogue shooter Robert Bowers (left), Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof (middle) and Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev (right). (Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, from left, Charleston County Sheriff’s Office, FBI via AP)

Only three inmates remain on federal death row as Biden’s presidency nears its end. They are Tree of Life Synagogue shooter Robert Bowers, Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof and Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

George Washington University law professor Jonthan Turley said Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis was “wrong” to bring the Georgia election interference case against President-elect Trump after a Georgia court disqualified Willis and her team from prosecuting the case on Thursday.

GEORGIA APPEAL COURT DISQUALIFIES DA FANI WILLIS AND HER TEAM FROM TRUMP ELECTION INTERFERENCE CASE

JONATHAN TURLEY: The immediate impact of this decision is overwhelming in terms of Willis herself. I mean, this court is basically saying that these cases are not supposed to be sort of vanity projects. You know, you were told by the lower court that you created this appearance of impropriety and the question for the court is why you didn’t remove yourself. Many of us at the time said that most prosecutors would have seen that their continuation of the case was harming the case and harming the public interest. Willis simply refused to give up the ghost and insisted that she wanted to be the lead in this. 

…

She was wrong to bring the case against Trump. You know, there are some viable claims here. You know, she charged some people with unlawful entry or access to restricted areas. Those are not particularly serious crimes, but they are crimes. She was wrong to go after Trump on this basis. She clearly wanted to engage in lawfare, and that’s one of the reasons why she wouldn’t give up the case. You know, when this issue was first raised, many of us wrote at the time that the correct move was to remove yourself. You selected a former lover as the lead counsel. That violated, in my view, core ethical requirements. He was ultimately disqualified by the court. But Judge McAfee gave her a chance to do the right thing. He said, look, this is your conduct is wrong here and you can remove yourself. Well, he was talking to the wrong person. She had no interest in removing herself. I mean, lawfare is only valuable if you’re the lead warrior, and she was not going to give up that position. 

The court did not toss Trump’s indictment entirely, but Willis and the assistant DAs working in her office now have “no authority to proceed.”

“After carefully considering the trial court’s findings in its order, we conclude that it erred by failing to disqualify DA Willis and her office,” the filing states. “The remedy crafted by the trial court to prevent an ongoing appearance of impropriety did nothing to address the appearance of impropriety that existed at times when DA Willis was exercising her broad pretrial discretion about who to prosecute and what charges to bring.” 

In an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital, Trump said the “whole case has been a disgrace to justice.” 

“It was started by the Biden DOJ as an attack on his political opponent, Donald Trump,” he said, “They used anyone and anybody, and she has been disqualified, and her boyfriend has been disqualified, and they stole funds and went on trips.” 

Trump said the case “should not be allowed to go any further.” 

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Fox News’ Brooke Singman contributed to this report.