Police body camera footage captured the moment Florida police rescued a little girl from her mother’s Audi after she left it behind to go shopping.
Mother Anastasiya Motalava, 34, was arrested after her son was found burning in his car in Hollywood, Florida, on Sunday afternoon.
Police said a witness heard the boy screaming for help from a slightly cracked window, and footage showed police freeing them as bystanders gathered around.
It’s the latest in a disturbing series of children abandoned in hot cars across the country. Arizona father Christopher Scholtes, 37, now faces murder charges after his daughter died in their vehicle earlier this month.
Police body camera footage captured the moment officers rescued a little girl from her mother’s Audi in Hollywood, Florida, on Sunday after she left her behind to go shopping at Walmart.
When Motalava allegedly left her son in her hot car, Florida police said she did not run the engine to keep the air conditioning on.
Because the mother left one of the car windows slightly open, rescuers were able to free her son, who is less than five years old, without breaking the car windows.
Authorities said store surveillance cameras later discovered Motalava was shopping inside a Walmart for more than 30 minutes while her son was inside the car.
She was arrested and charged with one count of child neglect.
Mother Anastasiya Motalava, 34, was arrested after the incident and now faces child neglect charges.
With scorching temperatures across the country, leaving children in hot cars is an increasing risk during the summer months.
According to NBC Miami, nearly 120 children have died in Florida due to the problem since 1992, and 11 of those have occurred so far this year nationwide.
The Florida incident comes just days after Scholtes was charged with murder in the death of his two-year-old daughter, Parker.
According to Arizona police, Scholtes played his PlayStation for hours after leaving Parker in his car in 108-degree heat.
Scholtes told police she left her daughter in the car seat inside the vehicle because she didn’t want to wake her, according to a criminal complaint obtained by DailyMail.com.
He said he left her in the family’s blue Honda Acura pickup truck for an hour and a half after arriving home at 2:30 p.m., police said.
But new evidence presented by prosecutors suggests the girl was actually in the car for three hours in direct sunlight and was only discovered when his wife Erika came home at 4:08 p.m. and asked where her daughter was.
