MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Two young children were pronounced dead at a hospital Friday morning after they were found unresponsive inside a vehicle on Interstate 95 in northwest Miami-Dade, authorities confirmed.
According to Miami-Dade police, just before 2 a.m., 911 callers reported that there were two children unresponsive in an SUV in the northbound lanes of the highway near the Turnpike extension, which led to officers and fire rescue crews responding to the scene.
A Local 10 News crew was in the area around 6 a.m. as first responders were focusing their attention on a vehicle that was parked to the side of the northbound lanes with its hazard lights on.
Police sources told Local 10 that the children were foaming at the mouth.
The 3-year-old fraternal twins, a boy and a girl, were transported to Jackson North Medical Center, where they were pronounced dead, police said.
Their cause of death has not been released. Speaking in Haitian Creole, their father, Milson Caldet, said he is devastated.
“I really loved my kids,” he said, speaking through a family member.
According to authorities, at some point, their mother, identified by family and friends as Shirlene Alcime, jumped from the overpass onto the train tracks below.
Despite the considerable fall, Alcime survived and was transported to HCA Florida Aventura Hospital, where she is listed in critical condition.
Caldet said he didn’t know what happened and said he had been trying to get hold of Alcime for days.
Alcime’s friend, Suzette Walker Morant, said she couldn’t imagine her hurting the children or trying to take her own life.
“That is not her, there has to be something wrong with her to do something like that,” she said. “The person I know would never do anything like that. That’s really sad to know the kids lost their lives so young, for she is not that kind of person.”
Walker Morant added, “It is just so mind-boggling right now to figure out what really went wrong.”
“Right now, our investigators are working to piece this tragic incident together. There are many, many questions that they have that they’re working to find the answers to,” Detective Andre Martin told reporters at the scene.
No other details were immediately released.