The Bergen County Sheriff's officer who rescued a wailing, sweat-soaked toddler from inside a locked minivan parked at a New Jersey Costco earlier this week said Friday that the child's screams carried across the parking lot.
"Before I even approached the vehicle, I could hear the child screaming and crying," officer Richard Carrion said.
Carrion showed off the baton that he used to smash the minivan's rear right side window so he could rescue the boy from the sweltering car.
"Knowing the severity of the temperature outside the vehicle, you can only imagine what it was like inside," Carrion said.
Cell phone video shows the moment the toddler, covered in sweat, was pulled to safety and cuddled by Carrion's partner.
It all started Thursday afternoon after concerned passersby in the parking lot at the Hackensack Costco began gathering around the minivan, and at least two tried to push down a window, which was already cracked a few inches, cellphone video shows. The child's cries can be heard from inside the car.
While the child was believed to be a girl Thursday, it is now believed that a boy was locked in the car.
One of the men seen trying to get in through the window, Rafael Rodriguez, recounted to NBC 4 New York, "I'm telling the [boy], 'Don't cry, we're gonna get you out.' [He] was drenched in sweat and crying constantly."
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Moments later in the video, police officers arrive and one smashes the window, pulls open the sliding door, and another goes into the car to retrieve the child.
"Where are the parents?" asked one bystander.
"I think shopping," another says.
"Are you...kidding me?" he responds.
As the officer emerges from the minivan with a small, crying boy in her arms, the bystanders are stunned.
"Oh, my God," says the woman taping the scene.
The distressed boy cries in the arms of Sonya Vekier, a Bergen County Sheriff's officer, who rubs his back and says, "[He's] soaking wet." In the video, the boy's hair appears to be matted to his forehead with sweat.
"I have a 2-year-old at home, so just to get him calm because he just did not want to stop crying," Vekier said.
"Sweat was just coming down, almost as if someone threw a bucket of water on [him], that's how bad it was," Rodriguez said.
Seconds later, the boy's mother arrives at the vehicle with a loaded shopping cart and another child. Vekier scolds the mother: "You left [him] in the car!"
The mother says "sorry, sorry," and the officer responds, "No 'Sorry!' [He] could have died!"
A Costco shopper, told NBC 4 New York that "sorry" isn't enough.
"It's dangerous! Children die!" the shopper said.
It's unclear how long the 2-year-old boy was inside the locked car. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says the temperature inside a car, even with the windows open, can jump about 20 degrees in 10 minutes.
An officer estimated it was at least 80 degrees inside the van, according to Bergen County Sheriff's Office. Temperatures outside hit 90 degrees, though, according to meteorologists.
Rodriguez said it was clear the mother was gone for awhile.
"I thought maybe she forgot something that she was gonna grab. I was surprised to see the shopping cart was full," he said.
The boy was taken to Hackensack University Medical Center and turned over to his father, the sheriff's office said.
Police arrested the mother, Chaeyoung Lim-Kim, for child endangerment and released her with a desk ticket.
Lim-Kim admitted to authorities that she left the boy in the car while she went grocery shopping because he was asleep. She's facing charges of child endangerment.
Costco workers told NBC 4 New York that they keep an eye on cars on sweltering days because of incidents like this.
"Most of the time we see dogs, like animals and stuff like that," Nelson Martes, a Costco worker, said. "This is the first time I've seen this happen at all."
