HAMLET — A foster parent is facing criminal charges after allegedly leaving an infant in a hot vehicle, leading to its death.
According to an arrest warrant, 59-year-old Djuna Tillman Bostick, of Hamlet, left her 7-month-old child in a 2017 Toyota Sienna van “for an unknown period of time” on Monday, June 9.
Police responded to a home on Charlotte Street in reference to a medical emergency where they found the child unresponsive, according to a press release.
The warrant states that the outside temperature was around 90 degrees. The child was later pronounced dead at a hospital “due to the excessive heat,” according to the warrant.
Bostick was arrested and charged with negligent child abuse with serious physical injury and involuntary manslaughter. She is being held in the Richmond County Jail on a $500,000 secured bond and is scheduled to appear in court June 23.
Police say the case is still under investigation.
All defendants facing criminal charges are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
According to Safe Kids, the temps inside a vehicle can rise 19 degrees in 10 minutes and a child’s body heats up three to five times faster than an adult.
In 2022, the Richmond County Sheriff’s Office set up a display showing the disparity in temperatures between the outside and inside a vehicle.
The digital display showed the outside temperature was 86.2 degrees Fahrenheit around 2 p.m. Inside the car, however, it was 116 — a difference of roughly 30 degrees. That was on a cloudy day.
An average of 39 children die from heat exposure inside vehicles each year across the U.S., according to Safe Kids. There were 32 children to die in hot vehicles in North Carolina from 1998-2002.
