Photo: TravelPulse
Some people need to learn to prioritize. One mother from Tennessee left her 6-month daughter locked in the car in the hot weather, to hit a bar for shots on National Tequila Day.
Yes, she drove herself to the bar, where she planned to get drunk and then (probably) drive herself back home. Yes, she left her infant locked inside the hot car while she got her drink on.
People Magazine reports that Rachel Vanwagner, the 26-year-old woman in question, parked her car in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant on Highway 70 in Arlington and went inside. Deputies from the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office were called on the scene by a couple passing by, who heard the cries of the baby in the car, at around 7 o’clock in the evening.
They arrived with EMTs and proceeded to remove the child from the vehicle. The baby was sweating and appeared distressed, but was otherwise unharmed. Meanwhile, the temperature outside was of 92 degrees, which means it was at least 100 inside the vehicle. The car was not running, but the mother had left the windows opened “a crack.”
While policemen and ETMs were working to remove the baby from the car, the mother appeared, running out from the bar barefoot. She started crying, telling responders that she’d only been inside for 30 minutes, during which time she’d had just 1 drink. Cops arrested her either way.
“She seemed almost hysterical,” the man who called 911 said. “Maybe that she got caught or maybe that her baby was in the arms of a paramedic. I don’t know, tough to tell, hard to put yourself in the mind of someone that would leave a baby in a car.”
“When you walk outside you don’t expect to hear a baby in a car and when you do immediately as a parent you perk up. The child was hot. We could tell that she was sweating, but we knew she wasn’t in immediate danger yet,” he added.
The mother has been charged with child abuse and neglect, and is now out on bond.
People Magazine reports that Rachel Vanwagner, the 26-year-old woman in question, parked her car in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant on Highway 70 in Arlington and went inside. Deputies from the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office were called on the scene by a couple passing by, who heard the cries of the baby in the car, at around 7 o’clock in the evening.
They arrived with EMTs and proceeded to remove the child from the vehicle. The baby was sweating and appeared distressed, but was otherwise unharmed. Meanwhile, the temperature outside was of 92 degrees, which means it was at least 100 inside the vehicle. The car was not running, but the mother had left the windows opened “a crack.”
While policemen and ETMs were working to remove the baby from the car, the mother appeared, running out from the bar barefoot. She started crying, telling responders that she’d only been inside for 30 minutes, during which time she’d had just 1 drink. Cops arrested her either way.
“She seemed almost hysterical,” the man who called 911 said. “Maybe that she got caught or maybe that her baby was in the arms of a paramedic. I don’t know, tough to tell, hard to put yourself in the mind of someone that would leave a baby in a car.”
“When you walk outside you don’t expect to hear a baby in a car and when you do immediately as a parent you perk up. The child was hot. We could tell that she was sweating, but we knew she wasn’t in immediate danger yet,” he added.
The mother has been charged with child abuse and neglect, and is now out on bond.
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