A 4-month-old Florida baby passed away after police say a daycare co-owner and director forgot to take the infant out of a daycare van on Wednesday. The infant was inside the hot van for around five hours.

NBC News reports that the incident happened at the Ewing’s Love & Hope Preschool and Academy in Jacksonville, off of the 5800 block of Lenox Avenue. According to a statement released by the Jacksonville Police Department, authorities received a call about an unresponsive infant a little after 1 p.m.

Emergency responders arrived to the scene and found a small infant girl unresponsive, strapped in a car seat inside the van. After trying to resuscitate the baby, responders rushed her to a local hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

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Police said that the co-owner and director of the daycare, Darryl Ewing, picked the baby up earlier that morning and brought her to the facility. He arrived to the daycare at around 8:25 a.m. While the other children in the van were “offloaded and taken into the center,” the baby girl was left inside the vehicle.

“The suspect, Darryl Ewing, was the sole driver of the van the entire time. No other employees were on the transport van during the transit to the center,” police said. “The suspect parked the van in front of the daycare and left the vehicle unattended with the victim still strapped in her car seat in the third row of the van.”

Police also said that it wasn’t until the baby’s mother contacted they daycare that employees discovered the baby inside the vehicle. The woman called the daycare to make after-care arrangements for her children when she discovered her baby never made it into the facility. Daycare employees then went to the van and discovered the infant.

Ewing is also responsible for keeping up with a logbook and entering the name of each child that’s picked up each morning. Investigators reviewed the logbook and determined that although Ewing logged in the baby’s two siblings, he never added the infant’s name.

Authorities arrested Ewing and took him to the JPD station, but he apparently became uncooperative and refused to talk. He’s been charged with child neglect.

Check back with CrimeOnline as additional details become available.

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[Feature Photo: Pixabay]