Man leaves 1-year-old girl in vehicle during 97 degree weather

ORANGE CITY, Fla. (FOX 35 WOFL) - Neighbors in Volusia County rushed to the rescue of a 1-year-old baby girl in a hot car in the sweltering heat Monday afternoon.

“Her face was beat red and her hair was all wet, her clothes were wet from sweat, so it’s a good thing that we got her out of there when we did,” said Debbie Barrien.

It all started when deputies say 25-year-old Andrew Kay was parked in front of a mailbox on Sparkman Avenue in Orange City -- neighbors thought his car had just broken down, but soon realized it was much more serious.

“Then all of a sudden we saw him pull a baby out of the car, and so we got really alarmed because we knew it had about 30 to 45 minutes that the baby had been in the hot car,” said King.

Christie King took cell phone video of the suspect, where you can see him holding the baby and getting into the car, deputies say it was approximately 97 degrees at the time, that’s when neighbors took matters into their own hands.

“My husband talked the gentlemen into giving him the baby,” King said.

“Me and my other neighbor took it in the house and we got her some cold water and put a cool rag on her face and just tried to cool her down in the A/C,” Barrien said.

EMS crews arrived to check out the baby who was okay and turned over to her mother, the suspect, who deputies say had  been drinking was charged with child neglect,  neighbors are just glad they stepped in when they did. 

“Two of us were calling the cops and one was getting the baby and me and the other one was cooling off the baby, yea, it was good neighbors coming together,”  Barrien said.
Volusia County deputies also forwarded the incident to DCF investigators.