Police in Alabama said a 3-year-old boy drowned in a bathtub this week as his father smoked a cigarette outside.

Police responded to a home in Daphne at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday, where they discovered the unresponsive toddler and reportedly learned that his father had left him unattended in the bathtub. The Baldwin County Sheriff’s Office claimed the father returned to the bathroom after taking a smoke break and discovered his son lying face down in the tub, according to WALA.

Though the father and emergency crews attempted to revive him, the 3-year-old was pronounced dead at the hospital.

WEAR reported that the boy was left alone in the tub for less than five minutes.

“He wasn’t outside for an extended period of time. It was just for a few moments so unfortunately, when he came back in, what had happened to his son had happened,” police Captain Steve Arthur told WALA.

While investigators believe it was an accident, they’re still in the process of reviewing the deadly incident. AL.com reported that the Department of Forensic Sciences will be performing an autopsy to determine how the toddler died.

Arthur went on to tell local news station WPMI, “It’s very, very tough to investigate it to try and be unbiased in your investigation. You need to let the investigation take you where it leads you and don’t make snap judgments, and that’s what we are doing in this case. It appears to be an accident but if our investigation takes us somewhere else then we will do what’s appropriate,”

The name of the deceased toddler and his father haven’t been released to the public.

[Featured image: Pixabay]