A 3-year-old boy who was in the care of a contractor for Alabama’s human resources department has died after being left in a hot car for about five hours, the authorities said, prompting an investigation and a call from state lawmakers for better oversight.
The child, Ke’Torrius Starkes, Jr., who was in foster care, had been picked up at about 11:30 a.m. on Tuesday after a supervised visit with his father, the boy’s aunt, Brittney DeBruce, said. She said the child was supposed to be transported to a day care program by a worker for a contractor with the human resources department, which oversees child protection, foster care and other social services.
Ke’Torrius, whose nickname was KJ, was left in a vehicle from about 12:30 p.m. to about 5:30 p.m., on Tuesday in Bessemer, a southwestern suburb of Birmingham, Ms. DeBruce said in an interview on Friday.
A lawyer for the family, G. Courtney French, said in an interview that the woman who was transporting the boy was a worker for Covenant Services, Inc. He said that after she picked him up from the supervised visit at the Department of Human Resources in Bessemer, she bought food, dropped it off at home, went to a tobacco shop, and returned home again and parked.
Around 5:30 p.m., the day care center called her, asking where the child was, Mr. French said. KJ was strapped in the car, which had tinted windows, he said.
“This is a tragedy and a nightmare for any parent,” he said.
The Birmingham Police Department said that officers were dispatched shortly after 5:30 p.m. to a private home in Bessemer to respond to a report of an unresponsive child. It said he was “accidentally left inside of a vehicle while in the care of a third-party contracted worker through the Department of Human Resources.”
The Birmingham Fire and Rescue Service pronounced the boy dead at the scene, the police said.
The chief deputy coroner of Jefferson County, Bill Yates, said that a report into the official cause of death had not yet been completed. He said that by the time he arrived, the boy had been removed from the vehicle, a four-door sedan, by the adult who was in charge of him, who took him into a residence with air-conditioning.
“The child was found in a car that was ignition off, doors closed, windows up and it was hot in the car,” Mr. Yates said in an interview. He said so far there was “no other competing cause of death. Right now, we believe this is related to a child being left in a very hot environment.”
Temperatures were in the mid-to-high 90s on Tuesday afternoon in the Birmingham area, but with humidity factored in, it felt as high as 103 degrees at 1 p.m. and 100 degrees by 5 p.m., said Jessica Laws, a National Weather Service meteorologist.
The state’s Department of Human Resources confirmed on Friday that a child in its custody “was being transported by a contract provider when the incident occurred,” adding that the employee had been terminated. It did not name the child or employee or elaborate on the circumstances.
The worker who was under contract with the department was questioned by the Birmingham police, the police department said. A person who answered the phone at the contractor, Covenant Services, declined on Friday to comment.
When the law enforcement investigation is complete, the results will be submitted to the district attorney for any possible charges, Joe L. Roberts, the chief deputy district attorney for Jefferson County, said on Friday.
After the boy’s death, state lawmakers said they were seeking more information about what happened, according to statements published in local media. “We need answers, and we may need to examine state law to make sure this never happens again,” said State Senator Merika Coleman, a Democrat, who added that she was “devastated.”
State Representative Ontario Tillman, also a Democrat, said that his initial reaction was shock and confusion. “How and why did this happen?”
The average number of deaths in hot cars, called pediatric vehicular heat stroke, in the United States is about 37 deaths per year, according to the National Safety Council. Most of them were forgotten in vehicles, and in events related to not being dropped off at child care locations.
Ke’Torrius was the 16th child to die in a hot car so far this year in the United States, according to Kids and Car Safety, a nonprofit organization that advocates children’s and pets’ safety in vehicles.
Christine Hauser is a Times reporter who writes breaking news stories, features and explainers.
The post Outrage After Alabama 3-Year-Old Dies in Hot Car While in State’s Care appeared first on New York Times.
