A woman is facing child neglect charges after she left her 19-month old baby in her car while she shopped. At the time, the ground temperature during the incident was 92 degrees and with the humidity, it was 101.
Pinellas Park police were called out to the Target located at 7150 US Highway 19 North on Monday at about 4:50 pm. When they arrived on scene, a witness informed them that a 19-month-old child was left locked in a running sedan with the air conditioning circulating on low.
The child was crying in the car and the mother, 35-year-old Vita Abramenkova of Clearwater, was inside the store for a total of 40 minutes, and had no way of keeping track of the child or the vehicle. Abramenkova admitted to this offense, and was subsequently arrested on the charge of Child Neglect. The charges were determined based on the totality of the circumstances to include the time of day, the outside temperature, the age of the child and the incident location.
The child was released to her father, and Abramenkova was transported to the Pinellas County Jail on a Child Neglect charge.
Abramenkova claimed that she thought the child was asleep when she arrived at Target and she didn’t want to wake her up.
