Arizona mom tried to shift blame for deaths of children, police say

SUPERIOR, Ariz. — The mother of two small children found dead after being left strapped in car seats in a vehicle tried to blame their deaths on someone else who was supposed to be watching them, authorities said Wednesday.

A narrative of events released by the Pinal County sheriff’s office says there is no proof for 20-year-old Brittany Velasquez’s story that she dropped the children off with someone who was to care for them. That person’s name is blacked out in the document.

Velasquez is being held on $2 million bond on suspicion of two counts of first-degree murder in the Monday deaths of her 2-year-old son and infant daughter in Superior, a hardscrabble mining town of about 2,900 people some 60 miles east of Phoenix.

Authorities say Velasquez was the last person to see her children alive, when she left them in a car outside a family home at about 9:30 a.m. Monday and went to work. The children were dead when Velasquez returned to the car nearly 14 hours later. They were still in the car seats and wearing the same clothes they had on in the morning.

A cause of death for the children has not been determined.

The National Weather Service says the temperature in the region reached 75 degrees on Monday. “It is NEVER safe to leave a toddler, disabled person or pet locked in a car,” the National Weather Service says on its web page.

The advocacy group KidsAndCars.org estimates an average of 37 children die in hot cars each year in the United States.

Document details

“There was no proof that Brittany actually dropped the children off,” the document said. “It is known that the kids spent several hours in the vehicle as there was condensation on the inside windows of the vehicle and the children were cold to the touch.”

The document said Superior Police officers were called to the scene Monday night by Velasquez, who reported finding her two children unresponsive in a vehicle in front of the house. She told them the children were not breathing and blood was coming from their mouths.

They were pronounced dead at the scene.

The unidentified person Velasquez tried to blame for the children’s deaths denied there was any arrangement for her to care for them, authorities said.

The other person “stated she had no idea what was happening and did not know what Brittany was talking about,” according to the sheriff’s document.

Police report revelations

A Superior Police Department report from January cited an unidentified relative saying Velasquez left the toddler and infant with relatives for days at a time.

Superior police called Arizona child protection officials in early January because of those concerns about the children after the relative claimed Velasquez had stolen a $3,500 fur coat.

But the coat was later returned and the relative did not seek prosecution.

The police report also indicated that in that incident, Velasquez would not be investigated for child neglect or abuse unless the unidentified family member stated she was no longer willing to care for the children.

Pinal County Superior Court Administrator Todd Zweig said Velasquez would be represented by the county public defender’s office. A specific attorney has not yet been assigned to her case. Velasquez could not be reached at the jail.

Autopsies were being conducted to determine causes of death of the children, whose names have not been released. Autopsy results could take months, the sheriff’s office said.

The Arizona Department of Child Safety said Tuesday it had received two reports about the boy and the girl and that a case worker visited the woman’s home.

“The children showed no visible signs of abuse or neglect,” the agency said. It said case workers determined Velasquez had a job and that the apartment where she then lived in the city of Mesa had everything needed for her children.