Woman Leaves Baby In Hot Car To Celebrate Tequila Day

A 26-year-old mom from Memphis, Tennessee, was arrested allegedly for leaving her baby inside a hot, unlocked car while she went inside a restaurant to take part in National Tequila Day celebrations on Tuesday, authorities said.

Rachel Vanwagner went inside Cazadores Mexican Grill in Arlington to have a drink while her baby remained in the car which was parked in the restaurant's parking lot, reports said.

Vanwagner was charged with child abuse and neglect. The baby was sent to a relative and the incident was notified to the Department of Child Service, Fox News reported.

The police were called to the restaurant on Highway 70 after the baby was spotted by a couple who were in the parking lot. They heard the baby wailing continuously and then noticed that it was in the back seat of a Ford which was not running, the report said.

The man and his wife, who wanted to remain anonymous, told Fox 40 that they were leaving the restaurant in the evening when they saw the baby.

"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 man said. "The child was hot. We could tell that she was sweating but we knew she wasn't in immediate danger yet."

When the Shelby County sheriff’s deputies arrived, they saw the baby inside the vehicle which was unlocked. The windows were partially opened as well.

Officers took the baby from the vehicle and provided medical treatment. Seeing this, Vanwagner then ran out from the restaurant without her shoes on. She told the police the baby was hers and she had been inside the restaurant for about 30 minutes for one drink, the documents obtained by Fox 13, said.

"She seemed almost hysterical," the man who noticed the baby in the parking lot 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."

According to the police, Vanwagner was unaware that she left her child inside the car with the engine turned off. Vanwagner refused to give further statements.

The temperature that day was above 90 degrees. This means that the temperature inside the car was much hotter, Dr. Jack Tsao with the University of Tennessee Health Science Center said to NBC 12.

"Children are actually at greater risk for overheating because their ability to regulate their body's temperature is actually less and the skin surface area is different from an adult’s,” Tsao said.

A chart based on a study from San Francisco State University shows that a vehicle left out in the open in 90-degree temperatures for about 30 minutes will be an estimated 124 degrees inside.

"It's very upsetting for me,” Ceselio Torres, co-owner of Cazadores Mexican Grill, said, adding that as a father, it was heartbreaking to hear about the incident. "I have little girls and I always think about them first then me.”