Justin Ross Harris is an American web developer sentenced to life in prison for the murder of his 22-month-old son, Cooper Harris. He left Cooper in his car for over six hours in 90° temperatures. ^[1]

On June 18, 2014, Justin Ross Harris, then 33, strapped his son Cooper into his rear-facing carseat in the back seat of the car.

Harris then drove the pair from their Marietta, Georgia, home to a nearby Chick-fil-A. Afterward, instead of dropping Cooper off at his day care, which was minutes from the restaurant, Harris continued to The Home Depot corporate headquarters where he worked. At 9:25 a.m. Harris arrived at work, leaving Cooper strapped in his car seat.

Later that morning, Harris and some co-workers left the corporate campus to go to lunch.

Upon returning at approximately 12:45 p.m., Harris went to his car and opened the door to put away some light bulbs he had bough during the lunch break.

The defense says Harris did not notice his son, still in the backseat.

According to medical examiners, Cooper was likely already dead.

Sometime after 4:00p.m.,

when Harris was driving toward a theater where he was supposed to see a movie, Harris says he noticed his son.

A grand grand jury returned an eight-count indictment against Justin Ross Harris. The charges included Malice murder, two counts of felony murder and cruelty to children in the first degree.

Some of the charges in Harris' indictment stemmed not from Cooper's death, but from Harris' alleged habit of sending sexual text messages to underage girls.

According to prosecutors, Harris was having these illicit chats with as many as six women on the day his son died.