Forgotten Or Left To Die?

Did this dad-of-one make a horrible mistake? Or did he callously kill his son..?

- Alex Noone

The evidence upset the jury and everyone else in the courtroom in Georgia, USA.

Even the man accused of murder sat crying.

On the morning of 18 June 2014, dad Justin Ross Harris, 33, strapped his toddler son Cooper into a rear-facing car seat in his car.

Cooper was two months off his 2nd birthday.

They went to a fast-food restaurant for breakfast. And, afterwards, Justin strapped Cooper into the seat again.

Next, he was meant to drop Cooper off at daycare. His wife Leanna usually took him, but there’d been a change of plan that day.

But Justin was on autopilot. While Cooper dozed in his car seat, Justin drove to the office where he worked as a web developer for a DIY company.

He pulled up in the office car park and went in to his desk. And it wasn’t until 4 o’clock in the afternoon he remembered…

He’d left Cooper asleep, locked in the car, in the baking Georgia sunshine. That day, the temperature had soared to 32 degrees.

By the time Justin got out to his car, Cooper was dead. His little body had overheated hours before.

But it’d been an accident. Justin had forgotten his son, plain and simple. He hadn’t meant to. Now he’d live with the regret and the if-onlys his whole life…

At least, that’s what he’d said at the time.

But the police didn’t agree. They felt they could prove Justin had killed his son on purpose.