Child left in car dies; father arrested

A 21-month-old child, Riyad Adawi, died yesterday in Haifa after his father left him in a locked car for almost three hours. A magistrate put the father, 35-year-old Abed Adawi of Touran, under house arrest for five days.

Adawi, a social worker who deals with drug addicts in the north of the country, had traveled from his village to a work meeting at Houri Street in Haifa's Hadar quarter. He arrived at 9.20 A.M. and locked the car, forgetting his son inside. Only at noon did he remember the baby was in the vehicle. He rushed out but found Riyad lying unconscious on the back seat.

With the baby in his arms, Adawi ran back to the meeting place and an ambulance and police were called immediately. Paramedic Eran Goldstein said the distraught father wouldn't allow the rescue team to touch the boy. "He just kept shouting, `I know he is dead,' and wouldn't let us administer aid. We finally persuaded him to let us examine the baby. I took him to a side room. He had stopped breathing and had no pulse and was covered in burns from the heat inside the car. We tried to resuscitate him until the intensive care ambulance arrived with another team that also tried, but eventually the doctor had to pronounce him dead," Goldstein said.

The commander of Haifa police, Nir Maryash, said the father was completely hysterical when the police arrived. He was taken to the magistrate's court and charged with causing death through negligence.

Riyad was the Adawis' fourth child. His mother is a nurse at the Italian hospital in Nazareth. Abed Adawi's brother was killed last year in the terrorist bombing at the Mazza restaurant in Haifa.

Riyad Adawi, the boy's grandfather, said: "The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh. I am a devout man and that was apparently what the Lord wanted for the boy. I am a pensioner and I spent all my time with him. He was the apple of our eye."

The grandfather said the parents had enrolled Riyad two months ago in a baby-care center in Nazareth.

Abed Adawi said he normally dropped his three girls off at school and kindergarten and then took the baby to the day-care center in Nazareth. He said his son was usually very lively in the car, but yesterday he must have been asleep on the back seat. The family offered the child's organs for donation.

	Policemen carrying the body of 21-month-old Riyad Adawi from the scene. The father locked the car, forgetting his son was inside.
	Photo by: Gustavo Hochman / Ko