VALDOSTA, Ga. (WTXL) - Two parents are behind bars after they left their 3-year-old child in a hot car.
The Valdosta Police Department was called to a restaurant around 6:01 p.m., about a 3-year-old child that had been left unattended in a hot car on Monday.
As officers arrived on scene, they made contact with a concerned citizen and were told that a small child had been left in the car with the engine off.
They say temperature at the time was 86 degrees.
The child was removed from the car immediately and the officer found the parents inside the business. Thankfully, the child was uninjured.
VPD says the parents were identified as 27-year-old Timothy Kelly and 30-year-old Jessica Brown. The parents told the officer that they didn't think what they did was a problem because they had only been inside for 2 minutes.
Surveillance footage revealed that the pair had been in the business for 20 minutes.
According to a scientific graph by San Francisco State University, the heat inside the car would have risen about 29 degrees within the 20 minutes the child was left inside the car, with both windows rolled up and no air conditioning.
The outside temperature of 86 degrees combined with the increase of 29 degrees brings the estimated temperature inside the vehicle to 115 degrees when police arrived on scene.
Kelly and Brown were arrested and taken to Lowndes County Jail. Both were charged with one count of Reckless Conduct.
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