A father has been busted after allegedly leaving his 18-month-old son in a hot vehicle for several hours as he got a haircut and drank at a bar.
Scott Allen Gardner, 33, is accused of leaving his son, Sebastian, in his truck on the afternoon of June 6 and going drinking inside Hanky Panky’s Lounge in Ormond Beach, Florida.
Sebastian ‘was left helpless in a hot truck for more than 3 hours’, according to the Volusia Sheriff’s Office in a Facebook post.
Temperatures reached 92 degrees Fahrenheit that day and medical examiners estimated that Sebastian’s body temperature was 111 degrees Fahrenheit.
An officer with the Ormond Beach Police Department tried to revive Sebastian at the scene, but he succumbed.
The same officer arrested Gardner at his mother’s home in Ormond Beach on Thursday.
Body camera footage showed sheriff’s deputies and police officers walking onto a property in an residential area surrounded by vegetation. The deputies took Gardner, wearing a blue T-shirt and shorts, into custody without incident and escorted him off the backyard.
‘Honey, I love you,’ Gardner’s mother, Jody Thereault, could be heard saying as deputies led him away.
Gardner replied, ‘Love you guys!’
A man who was not in the frame could be heard saying: ‘Say goodbye, because you’re not going to come back here again.’
Gardner was handcuffed with his arms around his back in front of the vehicle, and put in the backseat.
The father ‘gave multiple false accounts’ of what happened, police said.
Gardner, of South Daytona, has been charged with aggravated manslaughter of a child as well as child neglect causing great bodily harm, and was given a $100,000 bond.
A GoFundMe page for Sebastian’s family set up by Melissa Camacho on behalf of Thereault states that ‘we mourne the sudden and unexpected passing of little Sebastian’.
It asks for prayers for Gardner and his mother.
‘No parent should ever have to experience the pain of losing a child,’ states the page.
‘I hope they can find some comfort in the love and support surrounding them. Sebastian’s spirit and bright light will forever remain in the hearts of all who knew and loved him.’
The GoFundMe page had raised more than $2,800 as of Friday afternoon.
Sebastian died two days before a Louisiana father allegedly left his 21-month-old daughter strapped to a carseat in a vehicle for nine hours when the temperature reached 105 degrees Fahrenheit, killing her.
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