Inset: Chad Martin (Kalamazoo County Jail). Background: The grocery store where Martin found his son deceased in the backseat of the car (Google Maps).
A Michigan man who accidentally left his 3-year-old son to die inside of a hot car for several hours last summer may, in the end, avoid significant jail time altogether, a judge ruled this week.
In January, Chad Martin, 36, pleaded guilty to one count of leaving a child in a vehicle causing death.
On Thursday, the judge overseeing the case sentenced Martin to spend nine months in the Kalamazoo County Jail — with two favorable conditions. First, the sentence is delayed to start until February 2026. Second, the judge also scheduled a conference for December of this year that could lead to the sentence being jettisoned entirely.
Regardless of his time behind bars, however, the defendant was sentenced to three years of probation that began this week.
𝗨𝗻𝗹𝗼𝗰𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗣𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗦𝗽𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮 𝗝𝗣𝗔 𝗥𝗲𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗼𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀: 𝗔 𝗚𝗮𝗺𝗲-𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗝𝗮𝘃𝗮 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘀
