A father committed suicide in a wooded area behind his Virginia home after realizing he had unintentionally left his toddler in the back seat of the car, where she had perished from the heat. On June 28, Aaron Beck, 37, shot himself in the head. When police arrived at Beck’s Chesterfield County residence, they discovered an empty child car seat as well as Beck’s car parked in the driveway with the back door still open. They found the toddler’s body inside the home.
Beck’s 18-month-old son Anderson is mentioned in the obituary, which they both share. It states that Beck “sacrificed his life to his son in an act of profound devotion and love.”
Police believe Beck forgot to drop off his child at day care
When Anderson failed to arrive at his day care, his family called the police. Beck drove 10 miles back to his house from work when he realised his son was still in the back seat, where it’s assumed he committed suicide. He spoke to a member of his family before returning home. Police think he said something suicidal in that conversation.
According to the US Sun, police officers visited the Beck residence. Police believe Beck went to work in the morning for three hours instead of remembering to drop off his son at daycare. According to The Sun, Virginia experienced 80 degree weather on June 28.
Beck is praised as “an amazing husband and father”
This terrible tragedy is tragic on so many levels. According to The Sun, Chesterfield police Lt. Col. Chris Hensley said, “Our hearts go out to the family and friends who will have to deal with this.”
To assist with Beck’s widow’s living expenses and funeral costs, the family set up a GoFundMe page. So far, it has raised more than $11,000.
“It was very challenging to write this post. Beck’s stepsister Lauren Riegel shared the GoFundMe information on Facebook along with a statement about the death of her stepbrother and his adorable infant. “Aaron was a wonderful husband and father to his lovely wife, Laura. She is totally destroyed and faces a difficult road ahead of her.
The lives of the father and son were intertwined with life and death
Anderson, Beck and Laura’s first and only child, was described as “beautiful, outgoing, and intelligent” in their obituary by family members. Draftsman Beck is remembered as a loving father who showered his young son with “enormous and endless love.”
The obituary notes that Anderson and Aaron’s lives were intertwined in life and death and that “the selflessness of his love was a testament to the possibilities of fatherhood, to the possibilities of the heart.”
It’s a failure of memory
David Diamond, a psychology professor at the University of South Florida, says that while some people might be quick to condemn parents who have left their kids in the car, this is actually “Forgotten Baby Syndrome.”
According to him, the memory system fails when a child is forgotten.
The desire to do something different from your typical routine is a part of your “prospective memory.” Additionally, “habit memory” exists. Diamond compares the latter to operating automatically. Autopilot takes over when prospective memory falters. “A parent leaving a baby in a car is not being careless; it’s a failure of the memory system,” said Diamond in his conclusion.