A 9-year-old girl died after being left alone in a hot car for hours while her mother was at work, Texas authorities said. The girl's 36-year-old mother left her daughter with some water and partially opened windows in a Toyota Camry outside a manufacturing plant in Galena Park, near Houston, according to the Harris County Sheriff's Office. The mother went inside for her shift around 6am Tuesday and returned at about 2pm to find her daughter unresponsive, ABC News reports.
Law enforcement was called and the girl was transported to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead. The National Weather Service reported Houston temperatures reached about 93 degrees on Tuesday. Officials said detectives are still speaking with the mother to understand her reasoning and the timeline. "You can be sympathetic to her situation," Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said, per the Austin American-Statesman. "It's never acceptable to leave a child in the car."
The mother initially was detained but was no longer in custody as of Thursday. Officials said they are awaiting autopsy results and a decision from the district attorney on whether to file charges. This marks the third hot car death in Texas in the past four days and the 13th such death nationwide this year, according to advocacy group Kids and Car Safety. A 4-year-old boy died in a daycare van in Brownsville last Friday and a 3-month-old boy was found dead in a car in Mission on Saturday, NBC 23 reports. The infant's father told police he had been drinking and forgot the boy was in the car. Criminal charges have been filed on both cases.
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