Unattended Va Toddler dies in car
 

By Michael Laris
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 10, 2008; Page B01

A consulting company manager left his newly adopted son sitting in a sport-utility vehicle in a Herndon parking lot for much of the day Tuesday, killing the 21-month-old child, police said yesterday.

The boy, Chase, was adopted three months ago from Russia, police said.

Miles Harrison, 49, of Purcellville was charged yesterday with manslaughter. He faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.

Dave Zorger, owner of Herndon-based Project Solutions Group, where Harrison is managing director, said someone went to the front desk at the end of the day Tuesday and told the receptionists about seeing something in a GMC Yukon with tinted windows parked outside.

"They said, 'Hey, Miles, is there something in your car?' and he went running outside," Zorger said.



Herndon Police Chief Toussaint E. Summers Jr. said Harrison was supposed to take Chase to day care. Instead, Harrison drove to work, and Chase sat in the SUV outside the building, in the 500 block of Herndon Parkway, for "at least several hours," Summers said. Exactly how long remains unclear. The high temperature Tuesday was about 90 degrees.

Zorger said Harrison arrived at work at the real estate consulting firm "sometime in the morning," and police said they received an emergency call about 5 p.m. that someone was performing CPR on an unresponsive child.

Summers said authorities think the manslaughter charge is appropriate. The investigation is continuing, he said.

"You can't leave a kid unattended," he said.

Summers would not say what investigators think happened. "Manslaughter is simply the unlawful killing without malice," Summers said. "It's really hard to know what was going on in Miles Harrison's mind at that point."

Zorger said he did not know whether some distraction might have contributed to the boy's death.



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Sad and tragic...soemthing we hear every summer.

Yeah..one of my friends left a puppy in a hot car a few years ago for an hour. Forgot the puppy was in there and she was running errands. She remembered and ran to the car. Found the puppy panting for air and looking like it was about to pass out. The adorable puppy is now a full grown HUGE pit bull.

I imagine leaving a CHILD in a hot car for HOURS is much much much worse.

That's so sad.

I hate to say that this is happening more often than people think. We just had a boy die after he was left in a SUV for hours in Portsmouth. Not to mention the two toddlers that died when they climbed in a neighbors car while playing (I believe it was in NC). How do you forget you have kids in your car?

As for leaving dogs in a car, that drives me insane when I see it in the summer. As if cracking the windows actually does something to relieve the intense heat.

Not really newsworthy.

It is newsworthy because it happens frequently. SO many parents leave kids in the car unattended while in the supermarket, bank, post office, etc. intentionaly! Now some people are so focused on work and talking on their cell phones that they're even forgetting they have the kids with them in the first place. Stories like this one are a good reminder to parents that it's never OK to leave kids alone in the car.

It should be a reminder that people shouldn't leave any living being alone in a car in the heat, be it baby, elderly, or animal.

Never,never, never - no matter how big a pain in the ass it is - NEVER leave the kids in the car.

I hate to think of the way that poor child suffered . . . :(

The last time I heard of this happening the parent who left the child in the car normally did not drop off the child as part of the morning routine. I can't remember if it was a man or woman, but the other spouse usually did the daycare drop and the child was asleep with he/she went to work.

It always boggles my mind when someone goes shopping with their dog. I was at PetCo the other day and someone came in because there was a dog in the car with all the windows up and was salivating all over the windows. It was 92 outside, so imagine how hot the car was. The manager paged for the customer (not saying why of course) but no one came. I was talking to the cashier and made the comment the owner probably wasn't for their store because they allow pets inside. Turns out the guy was in line a 2 people behind me checking out and 1 person behind the lady that did her shopping and made the report. With 4 of us talking about it in front of him, I hope he felt like crap.

Kevin...we will keep this in mind if it happens to you...


it hurts all the same....I JUST lost a brother in a car accident due to some young PUNKS that had no biz being behind the wheel...

NOT newsworthy sure...but it hurts all the same...you cannot imagine how me and mine are feeling right now nor can you imagine how this guy must feel doing this..but don't blow something like this off because it may not be 'news' to you but what this says is for parents to be more vigilant...don't put yourself in a position to suffer like he is suffering so that way you won't become the next 'not newsworthy person' in the newspapers

I hope he didn't mean it's not newsworthy because it happens all the time. :( I remember the woman who was drunk and left her child in the back of her car, and the man who left a toddler in the car while he was gambling in a casino. The worst was the couple who brought the child home from his baptism - mom thought dad had brought him in, dad though mom had - baby died. That one broke my heart even more than the usual. I'm glad they are covered in the news because it seems like such a common sense thing - and yet, it keeps happening, so obviously there is a disconnect somewhere. I wonder if you could invent an alarm that is sensitive to the weight of a baby in the seat - attach it to your key ring and if you get out of the car without the baby it goes off? Of course, the vast majority of parents who do this would never buy it.

Thousands of kids will also drown in pools and choke on hot dogs this summer.

Each case is equally newsworthy.

Sorry for your loss, but there's a reason I didn't read about it on cnn.com.

I don't think that he was blowing it off, I think he was just commenting on whether this qualified as "news." I kind of understand what you're saying about life-changing events (my wife and I were almost killed by a drunk driver in 2007), and I don't think Kevin meant to be dismissive in his post.

Also, as to the story - I really don't understand how someone could leave a small child alone like that. I understand being busy, I understand being distracted, but as a parent, there's a certain level of attention you should be giving to your child.

My heart goes out to him and the rest of the family, and I can't imagine going on in life after a tragedy such as this, but really, what was he thinking?

Agreed...I cant understand how you get so lost in thought that you forget about your child.

That's exactly why it's not newsworthy.