Toddler's Drowning Death in a Eastern Washington Hotel Bathtub Lands His Dad in Prison

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A man is heading to prison after letting his toddler drown in a bathtub in a Richland hotel room.

Jonnathan K. Rodriguez, 25, recently pleaded guilty to second-degree manslaughter in Benton County Superior Court for leaving his 13-month-old son, Kastin, alone in a tub last October.

Court documents said that Rodriguez hadn't previously committed any felonies so he faced a sentence of 1 1/2 years to slightly over two years. There was a joint recommendation that he receive the minimum end of the sentencing range.

Rodriguez, formerly of Prineville, Ore., had been living in a room at the Woodspring Suites with his toddler for six weeks.

Multiple neighbors had reported hearing him yell at or "talk very aggressively" to the boy to quiet him when he cried.

A day before the boy's death, a maintenance worker found the toddler alone while Rodriguez was outside smoking.

Then at 2 p.m. on Oct. 28, a hotel employee went to deliver a notice that the room needed to be cleaned. When he knocked on the door, he could hear the child crying, but couldn't get a response from Rodriguez.



Thinking that the child might be alone again, he entered the room and found Rodriguez asleep and the child crying inside a closed bathroom. Rodriguez woke up and the employee left.

But an hour and a half later, Rodriguez told officials he found the child face down in water in the tub, according to court documents. He told investigators he tried to get the child breathing before trying to get some help.

The boy died two days later at Seattle Children's Hospital.

Rodriguez told police the boy was in the tub with the water running when we walked out of the room to get toys and a towel.

He gave different estimates for how long he left the boy alone and police didn't find any toys where Rodriguez said he'd dropped them.

He also gave inconsistent accounts about whether he left the boy in a seat or an infant tub.

Police discovered the seat in another part of the hotel room, and found the infant tub underneath the bed surrounded by other items.