Brooklyn parents were indicted Friday on manslaughter charges in connection with the fatal drug exposure of their 4-year-old son while living in a family shelter in East Flatbush.
Yitzchok Sklar, 33, and Miriam Elkayam, 27, both of whom were living in the shelter at the time of their son’s death, were arraigned on an indictment charging them with second-degree manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, second-degree assault, endangering the welfare of a child and seventh-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, according to Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez.
On March 4, 2025, police and emergency medical personnel responded to a 911 call at a family shelter located on Glenwood Road in East Flatbush after a four-year-old boy was found unresponsive. Emergency medical workers administered Narcan, an overdose-reversal medication, and transported him to a hospital. The victim, Aron Sklar, was later pronounced dead and subsequent toxicology reports confirmed that the cause of death was fentanyl exposure, according to the DA.
Suspected fentanyl and other narcotics were allegedly recovered from the defendants’ residence, along with drug paraphernalia. The indictment supersedes the earlier misdemeanor charges against the defendants of seventh-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance and endangering the welfare of a child and adds additional charges connected to the child’s death, Gonzalez said.
“This indictment alleges a heartbreaking level of neglect that resulted in a fatal overdose of a four-year-old boy," Gonzalez said in a statement. "Parents have a fundamental responsibility to keep their children safe, and by allegedly allowing fentanyl and other narcotics into their residence, these defendants failed in that duty."
