A mother left her 5-year-old son inside a parked Mercedes with the windows up while shopping at a Walmart on a sweltering South Florida afternoon, police said.
The boy, who was frantically banging on the car window to get the attention of passersby, was eventually freed by Walmart employees, according to the police report.
Martine Louis-Jacques, 62, was charged with child neglect without great bodily harm and appeared before a judge on Tuesday. NBC 6 South Florida reported.
Police said the boy, who was not identified, was “scared and distraught” after being left in the vehicle for about 20 minutes while his mother shopped inside the Pembroke Pines store.
“Walmart employees observed the child (redacted) unsupervised inside the vehicle, which was completely enclosed with all windows rolled up,” it read.
Martine Louis-Jacques, 62, of Miramar, was arrested Monday after leaving her son in her hot Mercedes while she shopped at Walmart for 20 minutes.
A passerby in the parking lot alerted a Walmart employee to the situation, and store workers eventually freed the boy by ordering him to unlock the car from inside.
After employees brought the boy inside the store, he ran to his mother, police said. The two left the store without speaking to employees and before law enforcement arrived.
The Miramar resident was arrested at her home after police used CCTV to identify her car and locate her address.
The boy was freed from the car after attracting the attention of a passerby.
She was taken to the Broward Sheriff’s Office main jail and held on $3,500 bail.
Around 40 children die from heatstroke after being trapped in hot cars, according to Children and car safetyan advocacy group.
More than 1,000 children have died in such incidents over the past three decades.
