Awareness Sought on Hot Car Danger

July 14 -- It seems like a no-brainer: Don't lock your children inside hot cars and leave them there.

Yet, in the last 10 years, more than 300 children have died from heat after being left in an unattended car, and child safety advocates want parents to understand the dangers.

Right now, only 11 states have laws that make it a crime to leave a child in an unattended vehicle. Seven more states have laws pending.

But Heather Paul, executive director of the National Safe Kids Campaign, a group that works to protect children from all kinds of dangers, says awareness probably can do more than laws to solve the problem.

"I think now, with much more indignation on the part of so many of us and more media attention, perhaps we can bring these numbers down," she said. "I think the laws of child endangerment, in general, cover this egregious situation. I think even more important than the language of the law is education. And that's what we're dealing with — the ignorance of parents who don't know the consequences of heat, and they're paying a terrible price."

String of Incidents

Ten kids in hot cars have died this year alone.

In Texas, 9-month-old Lorenzo Rueda died in his mother's SUV on Tuesday in 90-degree heat. His distraught mother said she forgot he was in the car. He spent his last five hours on Earth strapped in his car seat.

In Columbus, Ohio, last week, Richard Joseph Poulin frantically called his child's mother to say he didn't know where 4-year-old Dominic was. Poulin had been drinking and didn't remember he'd left the boy in the car for 15 hours. Luckily, Dominic survived.

Last Sunday, a Good Samaritan saved the life of a 2-year-old boy when he was found passed out in his mom's car in Cleveland.

"My sister-in-law pulled him out and he was still really lethargic and his clothes were dripping with sweat," said Suzanne Hartman.

The boy's mother was shoplifting in the near-by mall, police say.

Tarajee Maynor, 25, left her 10-month-old girl and 3-year-old boy in a locked car near Detroit while she spent 3½ hours in a beauty salon. Her children died and she was charged with involuntary manslaughter. Her defense?