Florida baby dies after being left in hot car by babysitter now charged with manslaughter, deputies say
MCCLENNY, Fla. - A Florida babysitter has been arrested after deputies say she left a 10-month-old baby girl in a hot car where she died.
The Baker County Sheriff’s Office charged Rhonda Jewell, 46, with negligent manslaughter.
Deputies said she picked the infant up from the child’s home and drove to a house on Estates Street where she was scheduled to babysit the homeowner’s four children. She said when she arrived, the infant was still asleep, so she went inside to interact with the four children that were waiting for her. But she said while she was inside, she completely forgot that she had left the infant inside her SUV.
Rhonda Jewell mugshot courtesy of the Baker County Sheriff's Office.
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The child was found five hours later after the girl’s mother went to pick up her children.
"There is no time frame that is too short. We really need to just avoid any unattended period of time in the heat without an adult, without air conditioning. Right. These things can happen very quickly," said Dr. Eric Shamas an Emergency Physician with Bayfront Health.
File: Car temperature vs. outdoor temperature
This was the 14th death of a child in a hot car this year and the 6th in the state of Florida.
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These deaths are completely preventable.
Experts say there are technologies to alert you that your child is still in the car. That includes Bluetooth-enabled chest clips that will produce a loud alert that you can’t turn off until you go and unbuckle the child. The app WAZE also allows you to enable a function that will say "check your car in the backseat" once you arrive to your destination.
File: Doll in car seat
"Setting reminders on your phone, so if you’re the one that has the child this time, and you’re supposed to arrive to Walmart or work or the grocery store, wherever you may be going, set that reminder to check in the back seat," said Jessica Winbury with Safe Kids Northeast Florida and Wolfson Children’s Hospital.
With temperatures in the low 90s for Friday, inside your car without the ac on can feel like 110 degrees within 10 minutes and 134 degrees within an hour.