The scary ordeal unfolded about 4:15 p.m. Saturday, as temperatures in Kansas City felt like 110 degrees.
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Sarah Oropeza, the manager of a shoe store was ringing up a customer when one of her co-workers came running back inside the store screaming for help.
When she got to the little girl, she was covered in sweat, the windows were all closed, and the doors were locked. “I was just getting so mad that it wouldn’t break, and I was just praying, break the window, she is going to die”. Oropeza wrote on Facebook that she was working nearby when an employee alerted her that there was a child trapped in a hot vehicle in the parking lot.
She got it to crack when another woman found a truck hitch and threw it through the window. It’s a nightmare for any parent, but in Kansas last weekend it wasn’t the child’s parents who came to the rescue, it was a local store manager whose concern for the child pushed her into action.
“She was crying, and she was drenched in sweat, like her shoes were wet, her socks were wet”. She was so drenched in sweat.
A nurse who was on the scene gave the 2-year-old medical care.
“(They showed) no emotion at all, whatsoever”, said Oropeza.
It took around three minutes for Ms Oropeza to eventually break open the window and free the child. The case has been sent to the Johnson County District Attorney’s Office for charging, police said.
Police said they could not release the specifics on the citation.
The girl was deemed to be fine and was later picked up by her godmother. The two adults who were watching the child told police she had been alone for about four minutes.
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“We were all crying”, she said.
