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A Virginia father kills himself after he found his 18-month-old son dead in the backseat of an overheated car yesterday, police said.
“This is a horrible tragedy on so many levels,” Chesterfield Police Lt. Col. Christopher Hensley said.
Police speculate the father went to work in the morning for three hours and forgot to drop his son off at daycare during an ongoing heatwave. Temperatures in Chesterfield reached a high of 80F on Tuesday, according to The Weather Channel.
Preliminary investigation show the father died of a self-inflected gunshot wound after finding his son lifeless in the car. The Chesterfield Police have not released the name of father and son, officers told DailyMail.com.
He was found in the woods behind his home around noon, after police received a tip of where he might be located.
The child’s family alerted police yesterday morning that the boy had not shown up to daycare. Officers responded to the home located at the 14100 block of Aldengate Road after the family received suicidal statements from the boy’s father.
“Upon their arrival, they located the people in the driveway with an open door with an empty child seat in the vehicle,” Hensley said. “As they made entry into the residence, they found a deceased 18-month-old.”
The father was found shortly after, where the family said he would be.
“Out hearts go out to the family and friends that are going to deal with this, but we would be remiss in not taking the opportunity for people to take this moment and realize how important it is to obviously check your vehicles,” Hensley continued.
Seven children, including the 18-month-old, have died in the United States after being left in a hot car, according to No Heat Stroke.
He’s also the second to die this week: three-year-old Kendrick Engram Jr died on Sunday after his grandmother forgot about him in the back seat of a car after running errands in Georgia.
Engram was discovered by his uncle after he took the car to a fast-food joint. The boy was in the third-row sear of a Nissan SUV.
He died of asphyxiation after temperatures reached a high of 96F and a low of 90F on, the National Weather Service reported in it’s forecast.
Last week, Trace Means, five, died in a car after being left in 100F heat in Houston, Texas for two to three hours on June 20.
Investigators believe his mom, Amanda Means, forgot to unbuckle him after running inside their $1.4 million home to throw a birthday party for his eight-year-old sister.
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