A 2-year-old boy died after he was left in a hot car in New York on Monday — hours after an 8-week-old girl met the same fate in New Jersey, marking the 11th and 12th hot car fatalities in the US this year, according to officials.
In the latest tragedy, 28-year-old father Avraham Chaitovsky left his infant daughter in a vehicle for “an extended period of time” in Lakewood Township amid a sweltering summer heat wave, the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office said.
Officers responded to a report of a child in cardiac arrest near New Egypt Road around 1:45 p.m. Despite lifesaving efforts, the 8-week-old baby was declared dead on scene, according to police and prosecutors.
Chaitovsky was inside of the Kollel Cheshek Shlomo synagogue while his daughter was trapped in the hot car, News 12 New Jersey reported.
The father was arrested and charged with endangering the welfare of a child.
He was taken to the Ocean County Jail and additional charges may be forthcoming, according to the prosecutor’s office.
Meanwhile, shortly before 7 p.m. the same day, officers in Monticello, New York responded to a 911 call of a child in cardiac arrest inside a vehicle located outside Sleepy Hollow Apartment Complex, police told News 12 Westchester.
First responders were not able to revive the 2-year-old boy, who was pronounced dead at the scene by the Sullivan County coroner. It’s not clear how long he was in the vehicle.
The Post has reached out to Monticello police for more information.
Temperatures topped 90 degrees in the tri-state area on Monday as blistering heat has suffocated most of the country.
Monday’s tragedies are the 11th and 12th confirmed deaths of children left in hot cars in the nation this year, according to national nonprofit Kids and Car Safety.
Last week, a 5-year-old twin died in Nebraska after his foster mom left him trapped in a vehicle for seven hours in 89-degree heat while she went to work at a nail salon, police said.
Earlier this month, a 2-year-old girl died after her 37-year-old father left her in the brutal Arizona heat for hours as he played video games. He was charged with murder.
A total of 29 children died from hot-car related deaths in 2023 and another 36 died in 2022, according to the organization. The average number of US child hot car deaths is 38 per year.
Kids and Car Safety Director Amber Rollins told The Post on Wednesday that a majority of hot car fatalities involve loving, caring parents who slip into “autopilot mode” that leads to the child being left behind in the car.
“It’s really the product of the right circumstances. These cases, almost all of them, are very much the same,” Rollins said.
“The number one contributing factor is sleep deprivation, which is par for the course for parents of young children, combined with a change in the normal daily routine,” she continued. “A lot of these parents aren’t even used to having a child yet, and the first few months are brutal.”
Some safety tips the organization recommends to ensure the children are accounted for include getting into the habit of putting an item that’s necessary to a parent’s day — like a work laptop or wallet — in the backseat.
“The idea is that its training you of getting into the habit of opening the backdoor everytime you leave the vehicle,” Rollins said.
It’s also recommended that parents keep a “reminder item” like a large stuffed animal in their vehicles that “lives in the backseat of your car.” When the children are in the car, parents should put the item in the front as a visual cue to remind them their child is there.
Kids and Car Safety helped pass federal legislation as part of the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act which includes a mandate for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to issue federal safety regulations to the auto industry on technology that automakers must put in vehicles to prevent hot car deaths.
Rollins said safety standards were supposed to be submitted last fall, but they still haven’t issued it. They’ve repeatedly pushed back the deadline, with the agency announcing just last week they’d need until April 2025.
“Meanwhile, every week, children continue dying, families continue burying their children and it’s unacceptable,” she said.
Since 1990, at least 1,095 children have died in hot cars, about 88% of whom were 3 years old or younger, according to the organization.
