An Arizona man, Christopher Ryan Scholtes, was found dead in an apparent suicide just days before his scheduled sentencing for the hot car death of his daughter in 2024. Scholtes, 38, had previously entered a guilty plea for second-degree murder and child abuse charges related to the incident. According to FOX 10 Phoenix, the Pima County Attorney’s Office confirmed his death yesterday.
Phoenix police responded to the Scholtes family home near 3rd Street and Northern Avenue yesterday morning, treating Christopher Scholtes’s death as a suicide. This came after the high-profile case in which Marana police and firefighters found his two-year-old daughter unresponsive in the backseat of a car on July 9, 2024. The girl was taken to a hospital but did not survive, with an autopsy report showing a body temperature of 108.9 degrees, while temperatures outside reached up to 111 degrees on that fateful day.
Neighbors expressed shock over the news of Scholtes’s death, illustrating the impact of the tragedy on the community. As FOX 10 Phoenix reports, Patty Waxman, a neighbor, commented on the tight-knit nature of the community and their genuine concern. In a different conversation, Joseph Kendagor talked about having seen the family celebrating Halloween just last week…