A teenage father is facing murder charges after admitting he intentionally left his infant son to die in a scorching-hot car.

Landon Parrott, 19, brought his unresponsive 1-year-old to the Cleveland Clinic Union Hospital in Ohio on Thursday, where he told staff he had left his son alone to quickly use the bathroom inside.

Attempts to revive the infant were unsuccessful, and police later became suspicious of the young dad after his story began to fall.

He eventually confessed to deliberately leaving the child in the hot car after police gathered security footage of him leaving his son at 8.30 am and not returning until 1.50pm, after a whopping five hours.

As the child sat strapped inside the car, temperatures hit a steamy 87 degrees Fahrenheit (30 C), and authorities say the internal temperature of the car was likely closer to 130 degrees ( 54 C).

‘We estimate that would’ve made the interior of the car around 130 degrees and this child was in there strapped into a car seat with no fluids, no air conditioning, nothing,’ Det. Captain Ty Norris of the New Philadelphia Police Department told Fox 8.

‘Heartbreaking. It’s heartbreaking to see this unfold before your eyes,’ he added.

Parrott had returned to the car as he went to go pick up his wife from work. Investigators believe the child was left in the car so that his father could be left alone in the apartment for the day.

‘It appears that this was not a matter of forgetting the child but was a deliberate act so as the child would not be a disturbance while in the house,’ New Philadelphia Police Chief Michael Goodwin said in a statement on Facebook.

Parrott has been charged with murder, endangering children and involuntary manslaughter. The 19-year-old dad also told police he was aware of the dangers of leaving children in hot cars.

He is being held in custody on $250,000 bond.

An obituary for the young boy described him as a ‘loving momma’s boy’ who will be remembered by family for his ‘sweet disposition and gentle way with animals, even at such a young age, and for his enthusiasm for his best friend Mickey Mouse.’

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