.jpg "Archives")
Archives
Getty Images/iStockphoto
A 3-year-old toddler died Monday outside a Miami Gardens preschool after spending as many as six hours trapped inside a sweltering vehicle during one of the hottest days of the year, according to police.
Law enforcement sources said the toddler was one of several children from the same family who attends the Lubavitch Educational Center at 17330 NW Seventh Ave. Police believe the father, who was driving the vehicle and works at the center, accidentally left the child locked inside it early Monday as the family made its way into the school.
The temperature in Miami reached 93 degrees Monday, with the heat index a blistering 103. It would have been much hotter and suffocating inside an enclosed vehicle that had been in the sun for most of the day.
A source said the father — who along with the dead child hadn’t been named by Monday night — hurried out to the vehicle at about 3 pm after someone at the school mentioned that they hadn’t seen his child all day. Hey was too late.
Police detectives were interviewing the father well into the evening Monday to determine whether the death was an accident.
As of Monday night, Miami Gardens Police only released a two paragraph official statement that said the child was transported to the hospital and had died.
Police were seeking a warrant to access surveillance video from the school or any surrounding buildings that might shed light into what exactly happened. It wasn’t immediately clear how many of the children in the family attended the school.
Late Monday night, the Lubavich Education Center released a statement calling it a “tragedy,” and saying that the 3-year-old was the child of two employees who work at the center. Lubavich Dean Benzion Korf also said a therapist and grief counselor will be available for staff and students on Tuesday.
“The tragedy hits close to home and many in our school community have been affected by it,” Korf said. “No words can capture the heartbreak and sadness we feel.”
The Orthodox Jewish center’s, or Chabad’s website, says it offers camp and classes from preschool through high school.
It was too early Monday evening to determine if the father would be charged with a crime. Although it happens, parents charging for their child’s death inside a vehicle isn’t all that common. Detectives gathering information in the Miami Gardens case will pass it along to the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office, which will determine if any charges will be filed.
Florida, with its blistering summertime heat index, has the second-highest number of hot car deaths in the country since 1998, with just over 100. In 2018 and 2019, 53 children died in each year from heatstroke in a vehicle, the majority of them after being forgotten by a parent, according to the National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration.
Reporter Elise Gregg contributed to this report.
This story was originally published July 11, 2022 9:03 PM.
Comments are closed.