Crime & Safety
'Heartbreaking' End to Amber Alert Search: Boy Found Dead in Hot Car
Police think the death of a Michigan boy with Down Syndrome was a tragic accident in a summer marked by at least 19 deaths of infants or toddlers in hot cars.
“Little D,” as 5-year-old Derrick Holmon was known, was found dead in a hot car in what Port Huron police believe was a tragic accident.
The youngster, who has Down Syndrome, was reported missing about 8:30 a.m. Friday and was found seven hours later in a neighbor’s car in the 2500 block of Manuel Street after an extensive search by about 60 area law enforcement officers after an Amber Alert was issued to find him, WDIV, Channel 4, reports.
“It’s heartbreaking for it to end this way,” Port Huron Police Capt. Jeff Baker said, according to a report in the Detroit Free Press.
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Police said the parents of the boy said they saw him playing about 8:30 a.m., but when they woke again, they couldn’t find him.
Police think the boy died from the heat after getting into the car, which was parked two houses down from his parents’ home.
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Already this summer, there have been a rash of deaths of babies left in hot cars to die, including three cases of children left in hot cars in a 24-hour period in Connecticut alone. There have been at least 19 cases reported so far in 2014, including the troubling story of a Georgia man accused of intentionally leaving his 22-month-old son in the car for the better part of a day.
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