Sammamish girl strangled by jump rope on playground slide

A King County sheriff’s spokeswoman says a 4-year-old girl has died after accidentally strangling herself with a jump rope at a playground in Sammamish.

“She might have wrapped the jump rope around her neck,” said King County Sheriff’s Sergeant Cindy West. “She slid down and maybe the weight of her body trapped the rope around her neck and she was unable to free it and she was stuck there.”

West says the girl’s twin brother, mother, and an adult caretaker were nearby picking blackberries at the time.

She says deputies were told that the girl had put the rope around her neck earlier and that her brother had warned his sister that she was not supposed to do that.

The girl was found face down and unconscious on the slide at Samantha Smith Elementary School. She was rushed to Overlake Hospital in Bellevue, but could not be revived.

Investigators consider the death a possible accident.