ST ELIZABETH, Jamaica – Detective Sergeant Sheldon Dobson whose 18-month-old daughter died after being left unattended in his car for several hours last year had his $200,000 bail extended when he appeared in the St Elizabeth Circuit Court on Thursday.

Dobson, who appeared before presiding Judge Vaughn Smith in Black River, is to return to court on December 14.

His attorney Thomas Levene told OBSERVER ONLINE that Dobson is to make arrangements for a second lawyer to represent him in the Circuit Court.

“I represented him in the lower court. I will be representing him in the Circuit Court along with another attorney. Representation in the Circuit Court is to be settled,” said Levene.

On January 17, 2022, Dobson, during a change of routine, left his baby daughter in his car for hours when he got to work at the Black River police station. The child, Shaleah Dobson, died two days later at hospital.

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Reports at the time indicated that the child would have been cared for on a daily basis by her maternal grandmother, while her parents were at work, but a day-care arrangement was made after the grandmother fell ill.

The detective sergeant in his rush to start work, is said to have forgotten the little girl on the backseat of the car, and drove off in a police service vehicle to Warminster, south-east St Elizabeth, about a 45-minute trip by road from Black River, to carry out a further probe into the case of a former Haitian official who was held on January 15, 2022 along with his wife, and two children.

The detective sergeant at that time was assigned to the Black River police station, while the child’s mother, a sergeant of police was in the same St Elizabeth Division.

– Kasey Williams