Boy Dies in Pool Drowning; 3rd Child Victim in a Month

A 3-year-old Anaheim boy who was hospitalized Sunday after being found unconscious at the bottom of his family’s pool died Monday at Children’s Hospital of Orange County.

He is the third child to drown and the second under 6 years old in Orange County in the past month. Last year, seven children under 6 drowned in the county. Pool drownings are the leading cause of death for young children.

Thomas Chotkebys was found by his mother in the backyard pool in the 400 block of North La Reina Street on Sunday afternoon, Fire Department spokeswoman Robyn Butler said. His mother, police and paramedics performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on the child, who was taken to West Anaheim Medical Center and then transferred to CHOC.

The pool is surrounded by a wrought-iron fence, which Thomas sometimes climbed over, Butler said.

In an unrelated pool accident, a 38-year-old Orange man was recovering Tuesday from injuries suffered when he nearly drowned Sunday in a pool at an Anaheim Hills home. John Chaidez of Orange is in stable condition at Kaiser Permanente Hospital in Anaheim Hills, Butler said.

He was removed from the intensive care unit on Tuesday. The man apparently drank heavily at a Fourth of July party before going into the pool, she said.