Arizona Father Dies by Suicide Before Sentencing in Daughter’s Death

An Arizona man who admitted to leaving his 2-year-old daughter to die in a hot car last year has died by suicide, according to officials.

Christopher Scholtes, 38, was found dead in a Phoenix home early Wednesday morning -- the same day he was due to report to prison for sentencing. He had pleaded guilty in October to second-degree murder in the 2024 death of his daughter, Parker, and faced a sentence of up to 30 years.

Pima County Attorney Laura Conover confirmed that Scholtes "took his own life last night" rather than appear in court to begin serving his sentence.

Parker died in July 2024 after being left in the family’s car for several hours outside their home in Marana, near Tucson. Temperatures that day reached 109 degrees Fahrenheit.

Scholtes initially told investigators he had left the child in the vehicle for about 30 minutes with the air conditioning running, but later admitted he knew the system would automatically shut off. Court documents showed he remained inside watching pornography, playing video games and drinking beer while his daughter was in the car.

Bodycam footage released after the incident showed Scholtes panicking as police arrived and learning that his daughter had not survived.

Investigators later found messages from Parker’s mother, an anesthesiologist, who had repeatedly warned him about leaving the children unattended in vehicles. Scholtes’s older children from a previous marriage also told authorities he had a history of leaving them in cars.

Last month, one of Scholtes’s older daughters filed a lawsuit against him and his wife, alleging emotional distress and incidents of neglect dating back to her early childhood.