3-year-old hospitalised after driver forgets him in locked vehicle

Police have launched an investigation into the circumstances which led to a three-year-old child being left locked in a vehicle for hours.
Reports are that the child has been hospitalised after he was left for over three hours in a car which usually transport him to a private daycare facility at Mahaicony, East Coast Demerara (ECD), on Friday.
Relatives of the child took to social media and shared the distressing details of the child being found unresponsive in the locked vehicle.

According to the relative, the car driver would usually collect the child and other students to take them to school and transport them home afterwards.
However, on Friday morning, a tragic oversight occurred, leading to the child unintentionally being left inside the vehicle for several hours – from approximately 8:30h to 12:00h.
Relatives said that the driver, unaware of the child’s presence, locked the vehicle before leaving and it was only at the end of the school session, during the midday drop-off that the child was discovered unresponsive inside the vehicle.
However, Police in a statement late Saturday evening said that the taxi driver reported that as is customary, he picks up children and drops them off to school in his motorcar “and on the day in question he made several trips and about 09:15h, he secured his car on the road and went into his house. “
The driver claimed that he returned 30 minutes later he observed the child in the back seat of the car in tears and he immediately rushed the child to the Mahaicony Cottage Hospital for medical attention.
“Doctors determined that the child was dehydrated and needed oxygen and as such he was transferred to the Georgetown Public Hospital where he is presently receiving oxygen,” the police said in a statement.
Police have since taken the driver into custody for questioning, as investigations continue. (G9)