NEW YORK—A mother is defending her husband in the deaths of infant twins he left in a hot car in New York City while working an eight-hour shift.
Marissa Rodriguez says her husband, Juan Rodriguez, is a good person and would never have hurt the children intentionally.
The mother of the 1-year-old twins who died when they were forgotten in their father's car is speaking in defense of her husband.
NBC New York စာစုတင်ရာတွင် အသုံးပြုမှု ၂၀၁၉၊ ဇူလိုင် ၂၈၊ တနင်္ဂနွေနေ့
“Though I am hurting more than I ever imagined possible, I still love my husband,” she said in a statement, reported NBC. “He is a good person and great father and I know he would’ve never done anything to hurt our children intentionally.”
“I know he will never forgive himself for this mistake,” his wife said, adding “I need him by my side to go through this together.”
She said her husband “will never forgive himself for this mistake.”
The 39-year-old man pleaded not guilty to charges of manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide.
ABC News စာစုတင်ရာတွင် အသုံးပြုမှု ၂၀၁၉၊ ဇူလိုင် ၂၈၊ တနင်္ဂနွေနေ့
Rodriguez told police, “I blanked out. My babies are dead. I killed my babies,” prosecutors said Saturday.
He told the officers he thought he had dropped the twins off at day care before he went to his job at a Bronx hospital on Friday, according to a criminal complaint filed by the district attorney’s office.
“He carried on with his day,” the New York Post reported that Assistant District Attorney Jaime Breslin told the judge at Rodriguez’s arraignment. “He forgot his children in the seats.”
Rodriguez sobbed as he pleaded not guilty to two counts each of manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide and endangering the welfare of a child. He was released late Saturday on $100,000 bail. He is due back in court Aug. 1.
His attorney, Joey Jackson, told CNN that his client was “inconsolable and beside himself.”
“The (Rodriguez) family has ripped apart,” Jackson said. “His mental state is very fragile based on what happened. It’s just an awful scenario.”
According to his attorney, a judge asked that Rodriguez be put on suicide watch.
Juan Rodriguez pleads not guilty to charges for the deaths of his one-year-old twins, left in his hot car for hours. Prosecutors say Juan Rodriguez cried, “I killed my babies,” after discovering them Friday afternoon. He told cops he thought he dropped them off at daycare. pic.twitter.com/xB0bv1uDNF
— Amanda Bossard (@amandabossard) July 28, 2019
Rodriguez lives in the Rockland County hamlet of New City, where neighbors said they were shocked by the news of the deaths.
One neighbor described them as loving and attentive parents, reported the New York Post.
“They were July babies. It was just this month they had a big party—a bouncy house, the whole thing.”
“I’ve never seen them outside unattended,” the neighbor said, referring to the couple’s twins and 4-year-old.
“He would never hurt his children,” another neighbor told the New York Post. “He’s a very loving father … it’s beyond crazy.”
A New York father has been charged over the death of his one-year-old twins. Police say they were strapped into their car seats for eight hours while temperatures soared. Juan Rodriguez thought he’d dropped them at daycare before going to work. #7NEWS pic.twitter.com/nOkFHc4AQN
— 7NEWS Brisbane (@7NewsBrisbane) July 29, 2019
The Associated Press and Epoch Times reporter Simon Veazey contributed to this report
