An Arizona mother has been arrested and charged with child abuse after she allegedly abandoned her two-year-old son in an “extremely hot” garage and exposed him to dr*gs.
The incident took place on July 29 when a concerned neighbor dailed 911 to report that Amy Shellhammer, 31, had left the toddler alone in the un-air-conditioned garage.
According to court documents, Shellhammer sent a text to her neighbor, also a foster mother of other children, “I’m leaving (child) is in the garage. I’m sicker than (expletive)… he’s asleep.”
When the neighbor arrived, she saw the baby asleep and couldn’t wake him for 20-30 minutes after bringing him out of the sweltering garage. The temperature on that day reached a high of 109 degrees.
As per the arrest affidavit, nobody else was at Shellhammer’s home. “The neighbor provided photographs of the victim in the garage and screenshots of the above text messages.”
On August 1, the Arizona Department of Child Safety (DCS) took custody of the child and took him for medical evaluation. The testing found fentanyl, metha***********, and THC in the two-year-old’s system.
⚠️ A neighbor’s decision to check on a 2-year-old boy may have prevented an even greater tragedy in Mesa.
According to court documents, the toddler was found alone and asleep inside an uncooled garage while temperatures outside reached 109 degrees. The neighbor reportedly… pic.twitter.com/wCWNT21lxQ
— RandomStuff A2Z (@RandomstuffA2Z) August 19, 2026
“The defendant admitted that she smokes fentanyl, m*th, and mar***ana 10+ [times] per day inside her residence with her two-year-old victim son present and said her son is ‘obviously’ exposed when she smokes,” according to the arrest affidavit.
“The defendant put the victim in a circumstance likely to produce death or serious physical injury.”
According to police, there was an active protection order, issued on August 12, 2025, in Colorado, that required Shellhammer to stay 100 yards from her son. She was initially arrested on August 1 but prosecutors declined to pursue the child abuse charge at first.
She was rearrested on August 17 after further investigation yielded additional evidence. She was held on a bond of $35,000 with a preliminary hearing scheduled for August 27.
According to Fox11Online, Shellhammer is facing one felony count of child abuse and one count of failing to comply with a court order.
Arizona has a documented pattern of child heat-related deaths. In 2024, a man named Christopher Scholtes was arrested after his two-year-old daughter, Parker, who was left alone in a car at 109 degrees for three hours, died. He pleaded guilty to murder and child abuse but died by suicide before sentencing.
Disclaimer: The Inquisitr could not independently confirm the facts of this incident and is reporting based on the information available.
