Cooper Harris would have normally been at his daycare facility when he left Chick-fil-A with his father at 8:55 a.m. on June 18, 2014.
Coopers’s teacher at the Little Apron Academy, Keyatta Patrick, testified Thursday that the 22-month-old was usually dropped off between 8:30 and 8:45 a.m.
Whenever he was late, she said, Coooper's father, Ross Harris, would call by 8:40 a.m.
But on June 18th, the academy never received a call from Harris. At 9 a.m., he backed into a parking space at Home Depot’s Treehouse office, grabbed his briefcase and reported to work, Cooper locked inside. Prosecutors say the toddler was purposely left behind, calling witnesses Wednesday who testified about deviations in Harris’s routine leading up to, and including, the day he died.
For instance, Patrick testified, Harris used to snap photographs of his son every day after dropping him off at Little Apron. He stopped taking them two weeks before Cooper’s death, which Patrick said she found odd. So she asked Harris, who told her it was due to Cooper “getting older.”
Patrick and another of Cooper’s teachers, Azure Hawkins, said Harris routinely stopped by Chick-fil-A with his son. Sometimes, by request, he’d bring breakfast for the instructors.
Little Apron director Melony Gibson testified that Harris was actively involved in his son’s life, often volunteering to participate in academy functions. Once, he even dressed up like the Home Depot drill.
Cooper, said Gibson, was “an affable child, calm nature, a normal, soon-to-be 2-year-old.”
Like his dad, he was a talker, Gibson said.
“We definitely knew when Ross was in the building,” she said.
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