Inset: Christopher Scholtes (Pima County Sheriff”s Office). Background: The scene outside the home where Scholtes’ daughter died from being left in a hot car (KOLD).
A father from Arizona, aged 38, could face a lengthy prison sentence after allegedly leaving his 2-year-old daughter to succumb to the heat inside a car parked outside their residence. During this time, he was reportedly engaged in gaming and browsing the internet.
Christopher Scholtes has entered a plea agreement with the Pima County Attorney’s Office, admitting guilt to charges of second-degree murder and intentional or knowing child abuse likely to result in death or significant injury, as announced by the authorities.
The agreement specifies that the sentences handed down by Judge Kimberly Ortiz will be consecutive. Scholtes is expected to serve between 20 to 30 years in prison without the possibility of early release, following the full term dictated by the court, for the murder of his daughter, Parker Scholtes, on July 9, 2024.
Previously, Scholtes was reported by Law&Crime to have declined a plea deal earlier this year, which would have involved pleading guilty to second-degree murder with a potential sentence ranging from 10 to 25 years.
Investigators have stated that Scholtes left Parker asleep in the family’s 2023 Acura MDX for several hours while engaged in PlayStation gaming and household tasks. It was also claimed that leaving the children unattended in the vehicle was a recurring behavior.
According to prosecutors, Scholtes returned home around 12:35 p.m. and decided to leave Parker in the car to avoid disturbing her sleep, allegedly with the air conditioning running. However, surveillance evidence contradicted his account, indicating he actually arrived at 12:53 p.m.
According to a report from the Arizona Daily Star, while on his way home from the doctor’s office with Parker, Scholtes stopped at two convenience stores, went in alone, and shoplifted cans of beer from both, likely drinking consuming some of those cans in the restroom of one store.
After arriving home just before 1 p.m., Scholtes made his older daughters lunch, messaged with his wife about a Christmas vacation, and then “surfed the internet for men’s clothing at Nordstrom and for pornography from 2:02 p.m. to 2:30 p.m.,” per the report.
The wife, Erika Scholtes, who was a doctor at a nearby hospital, returned home from work at about 4 p.m. Police said she arrived to discover the vehicle was no longer running and the AC was off. The temperature that day reached a high of 109 degrees.
The child was rushed to the hospital by paramedics where she was declared dead at about 5 p.m. that day.
Erika Scholtes spoke on behalf of her husband at his bond hearing, saying their daughter’s death was a mistake and did not “represent him,” according to video obtained by Tucson NBC affiliate KVOA.
Court documents, however, state her text messages with her husband showed he left his children in the car unattended regularly.
“I told you to stop leaving them in the car, how many times have I told you,” she texted him as she was driving Parker to the hospital, adding, “We’ve lost her. She was perfect.”
Text messages between the couple in the weeks leading up to Parker’s death also appeared to show a pattern of neglect from Scholtes. On March 11, Erika Scholtes reportedly texted him about drinking and driving with the kids in the car and his overall substance abuse.
“You haven’t shown me you can stop putting the girls in danger or not treat me badly,” she wrote in the message. “Even yesterday, you drove home drunk with two minors. You drink to excess every time. You can never have just one. I’ve been asking for three years to cut back and it’s actually gotten worse.”
When she accused him of replacing “cocaine with alcohol,” he reportedly responded, “at least this one is legal, right?” before admitting to being “a piece of s— addict.”
Just over a week later, Scholtes’ wife texted him about driving 138 mph with their “baby in the car” and “alcohol in [his] system,” per the Star.
