Baby left in auto for 2 hours in Joliet in critical condition

A 7 month-old boy is in critical condition after being left in a auto for two hours Tuesday in a Joliet parking lot. The mother told police when she parked her white SUV in the downtown Joliet lot, she had no idea her 7-month-old baby was still in the back seat. “At noon when she left the meeting she listened to the messages and realized the child wasn’t with the father”.

The woman had been out with her boyfriend, who is the baby’s father, and two other children along with the baby.

“While she was at the meeting, she received several phone calls from the boyfriend”, Roechner said.

The baby was revived by Firefighters on the scene, but was later transferred to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn after he went into cardiac arrest. It is believed that the woman was with her boyfriend at one residence and before heading downtown, she dropped him off at a different residence and was under the impression that he took baby inside with him. Temperatures in Chicago hit 90 Tuesday, with the heat index topping out at 100 degrees, according to weather.com meteorologist Chris Dolce.

When she had found her baby, he was unresponsive.

Police did some research Tuesday and determined the temperature inside the vehicle could have been 109 degrees while the baby was in it.

“You’ve got to make sure kids are out of the auto, you got to check your vehicle, you got to know where your kids are at all times, that’s our responsibility as a parent, that’s really the learning thing out of this”, he said. Police said they interviewed the parents extensively and it will be up to the state’s attorney to determine whether to file charges of child endangerment. Police say the mother was inside a nearby bank at the time.