A Florida babysitter is behind bars after she left a ten-month-old baby inside a car for five hours.
Baker County Sheriff’s Office says Rhonda Jewell, 46, had been occasionally caring for the infant since June and picked her up from her mother’s residence around 8 a.m. on Wednesday.
Authorities say she then drove to another residence, where she was babysitting other children as well. She is accused of leaving the infant in the vehicle when she arrived, PEOPLE reported.
The infant wasn’t discovered until around 1 p.m. when the mother came to pick up her baby, Jewell allegedly realized the infant was still in the car, per the press release.
The National Weather Service reported temperatures in the area to be 97 degrees around that time, with the temperature in the car recorded at 133 degrees when the child was found, NBC News reported.
Medical personnel reportedly said the baby’s external temperature was recorded at 102.1 degrees and her internal temperature at 110. Medical staff at the hospital told police that 110 is the highest temperature the thermometer could read.
Baker County police say the child was transported to Fraser Memorial Hospital, where she was pronounced deceased.
Jewell was arrested and taken to the Baker County Detention Center. She faces a charge of aggravated manslaughter of a child.
She appeared in court Thursday. Her bond has been set at $25,000 with GPS ankle monitoring also required upon release.
“Each of us are given the gift of life every morning we wake up and every evening when we finish our day, we are blessed if our family is safe and healthy,” Baker County Sheriff Scotty Rhoden said in the release. “In the blink of an eye, our world can be turned upside down. Please be mindful of this when trying to understand the tragedy that took place in our small town yesterday.”
