According to police, a father in Virginia committed suicide after discovering his 18-month-old kid dead in the backseat of an overheated car on Tuesday.
Lt. Col. Christopher Hensley of the Chesterfield Police Department declared, “This is a horrific tragedy on so many levels.”
Police believe that the father left his youngster at daycare when he went to work for three hours in the morning during a heat wave. The Weather Channel reports that Chesterfield experienced a peak temperature of 80F on Tuesday.
According to an early investigation, the father shot himself in the head after seeing his son dead in the car. According to authorities, the father and son’s names have not been made public by the Chesterfield Police.
Around noon, authorities received a tip about his whereabouts, and they were able to track him down in the woods behind his house.
On Tuesday morning, the boy’s family notified the police that he had failed to arrive at daycare.
After hearing from the boy’s relatives that the boy’s father was considering suicide, police were called to the home in the 14100 block of Aldengate Road.
When they arrived, Hensley claimed, “they found the people in the driveway with an open door and an empty kid seat in the car.” “As they entered the house, they discovered an 18-month-old who had died.”
Shortly after, the father was discovered where the family had predicted he would be.
Our thoughts are with the family and friends who will be affected by this, but we would be negligent if we didn’t use this as an opportunity to remind others how crucial it is to inspect their vehicles, Hensley continued.
According to No Heat Stroke, seven kids, including the 18-month-old, have passed away in the US after being left in a hot automobile.
Additionally, he is the second person to pass away this week; Kendrick Engram Jr., age 3, passed away on Sunday when his grandmother in Georgia forgot about him in the backseat of a car while conducting errands.
His uncle found Engram as he drove to a quick food restaurant.
The youngster was sitting in a Nissan SUV’s third row seat.
The National Weather Service noted in its forecast that the man passed away from asphyxiation after temperatures hit a high of 96F and a low of 90F on.
Trace Means, 5, passed away last week in a car after spending two to three hours on June 20 in Houston, Texas, temperatures over 100 degrees.
Investigators think his mother, Amanda Means, forgot to take him out of his seatbelt after rushing inside their $1.4 million home to celebrate his sister’s birthday.
Although Amanda has not been accused of her son’s death, the investigation is still ongoing.
The first heatstroke death in 2022 occurred on May 3 in Snellville, Georgia, and was an 8-month-old girl.
Since then, the number of deaths among boys and girls between the ages of three months and five years has increased.