Police: mom left one-week-old baby, dog in hot car

ATLANTA - Atlanta Police arrested a mother for leaving her one-week-old newborn baby and a Chihuahua in a hot car for close to half an hour.

Witnesses at the scene told FOX 5 they called 911 and waited at the car for more than 20 minutes before the mother, Carlita Blanco, finally returned.

The temperature peaked to a high of 71 degrees, Friday afternoon.

The 911 caller told FOX 5, after 4 p.m. Friday afternoon, he had parked at the Piedmont Center in Buckhead, and spotted the newborn in the car; he heard the baby crying and said the infant sounded in distress.

The baby was checked out by emergency crews at the scene and determined to be okay, but was transported to the hospital as a precaution. The dog was taken to Fulton County Animal Control.

Police arrested Blanco and she was booked into the Fulton County Jail for reckless conduct. An officer at the scene said Blanco told him she justified her actions, because she left the window cracked open.

The police report said Blanco claimed she went to pick up a check and a uniform from her employer in the building, and did not want her employer to know she had a baby.

The officer on scene said she was afraid to lose her job, due to having a newborn.

"There’s no reason to leave your child behind," said Officer Lukasz Sajdak. "Being left in a car for a short amount of time, it could get extremely hot in there and can result in some kind of injury," he said.

Temperatures in a car can rise thirty to forty degrees higher than the outside temperature, the longer the car is outside.