A 2-year-old girl and her brother, 9, likely froze to death as they bundled up with their relatives inside a van near a Detroit casino — months after the homeless family’s attempt to get into a city shelter fell on deaf ears, officials said Tuesday.
The young siblings were pronounced dead Monday afternoon after their frantic mother first realized her older child wasn’t breathing, interim police Chief Todd Bettison said during a press conference.
A friend who was already with the family helping them jumpstart their van started rushing the boy to the hospital in their Buick, but was forced to turn around after the children’s grandmother found the little girl also in trouble, he said.
The entire family, including three other children, then all raced with the friend to the hospital, according to authorities.
“Just on the surface right now it appears it was exposure to hyperthermia,” Bettison said of the cause of death, noting the family was living out of the vehicle for a few months.
The medical examiner will make a final determination what killed the two kids.
The van stopped working overnight either because it ran out of gas or had a mechanical issue, and could no longer produce heat in the below freezing temperatures, the top cop said. The family typically parked near casinos because it was a safe spot and they could access bathrooms.
The oldest child in the car was 13 years old, authorities said.
Mayor Mike Duggan said there were family shelter beds available just a few miles from their casino, calling the deadly result “heartbreaking.”
The mother of five called officials for help on Nov. 25 when they could no longer stay with a family friend, but “no resolution” was reached, he said, citing preliminary information.
The parent called the city for help two other times, including over the summer and another point the previous year.
“For whatever reason, this wasn’t deemed an emergency that caused an outreach worker to visit the family. … As far as we’ve been able to determine so far, the family never called back again for service,” Duggan said.
He noted the family didn’t call back again after reaching out on Nov. 25 and city homeless staff also did not proactively check on the family’s status.
Duggan called it a “terrible day in Detroit” and said a review would promptly begin to prevent another tragedy.
No charges have been filed, but police have interviewed the mother and grandmother.
