Times staff
Friday, February 17, 2012
TAMPA — Airport police caught a woman wanted in connection with the death of her 1-year-old son in a parking lot Friday afternoon.
Officers searched garages at Tampa International Airport after the Polk County Sheriff's Office notified them that Neha Patel had used her credit card at the economy garage Friday morning, according to TIA.
A parking employee spotted Patel's blue 2008 Toyota Sienna in the long-term garage just after 1 p.m., and officers found her inside the vehicle at 1:18 p.m., airport officials said. Polk County investigators came to the airport to question her, and she will be taken to the Hillsborough County Jail.
Patel, 32, a former pharmacist from Lakeland, fled her home early Friday after confessing to her husband that she had killed their son, Ihsan, according to the Polk County Sheriff's Office.
She suffers from postpartum depression and threatened to kill herself before leaving, her husband told authorities.