Arizona dad who left 2-year-old daughter to die in sweltering car was distracted by po*n: prosecutors
The Arizona father accused of leaving his toddler to cook to death in a sweltering car was allegedly watching pornography as the 2-year-old was left sleeping in the cruiser for more than three hours, prosecutors revealed during a court hearing Tuesday.
Christopher Scholtes, 37, was distracted watching the X-rated videos when he left his youngest daughter, Parker, inside a car parked in the driveway of his Marana home during a scorching 109-degree day last summer, the DailyMail.com reported.
Prosecutors said the careless dad was also playing video games and drinking beers as his daughter perished from heat exposure inside the searing 2003 Acura on July 9, 2024.
Before returning home, Scholtes also left Parker alone in the car at a gas station and a supermarket, where surveillance footage captured him stealing the cans of beer, according to court documents obtained by the outlet.
Scholtes first claimed he left the napping tot in the car with the air conditioning blasting for 30 minutes after returning home from shopping at around 12:30 p.m. because he didn’t want to wake her.
But court records later showed he zoned out on video games for more than three hours, until his horrified doctor wife, Erika, came home at 4 p.m. and found the child unconscious in his car.
The young girl was pronounced dead an hour later at Banner University Medical Center – the same hospital where her mother worked as an anesthesiologist.
The porn-distracted dad later reportedly admitted that he knew the vehicle’s engine would automatically shut off after 30 minutes.
Erika scolded her husband in a series of text messages after the tragedy that described a disturbing pattern of neglect, court documents showed.
“I told you to stop leaving them in the car,” the devastated mother said during the heart-breaking exchange, in which she called her youngest daughter “perfect.”
Scholtes later replied, admitting that he “killed our baby” and apologizing.
Scholtes’ two other daughters told cops their dad sometimes left them alone in the car while he “got distracted by playing his game and putting away his food,” according to police records.
His older daughter – whom he shared with another woman and lost custody of earlier this year – had also been abandoned in her father’s car in the past, but she was old enough to know how to restart the vehicle to keep the rest of the children alive, the 16-year-old girl’s family told police, the outlet reported.
Scholtes is also accused of repeatedly physically abusing his eldest daughter, according to the Department of Child Services, which reported that he frequently slapped her, threw her, and slammed her head against walls.
Despite being charged with first-degree murder for the alleged heinous killing – to which he has pleaded not guilty – the father-of-four’s wife has remained by his side, calling the tragic incident a “big mistake.”