I've read that article before FATEdestiny and it is very moving.
However whenever I hear about another instance of a child being left in a car this article is the one I always think of.
And I can't see how it could be anything other than neglect.
The parents returned home at 11:30pm after doing laundry at another relatives house.
They took their elder daughter, age 2, into the house with the laundry but both apparently assumed the other parent had brought in their 7 month old as well.
Neither of them did and the baby spent the night outside in the car.
At 12 noon the next day, the father woke up and got out of bed.
He left his partner in bed and went to the gym, without checking on either of his daughters.
So that's a seven month old and a two year old, not checked, not changed, not fed, for over twelve hours.
And he just gets up and lunchtime and goes to the gym.
With his daughter's body in the back of the car, and still he doesn't notice her.
Then his partner gets out of bed at 2pm, and finally notices her baby is missing, fourteen and a half hours after they got home.
So that's still two very young children not fed, changed, given anything to drink, or even looked at, for all that time, all those hours.
And when she finally does get out of bed and realises the seven month old is missing, she rings him at the gym and he finally goes to look in the car and finds that poor baby.
Over fourteen and a half hours too late.
I try to be sympathetic to people, I really do. And I do see how people can forget and tragedies like this happen. If it's a difference to their routine and they just don't think. I can even see how the French couple might have been distracted by a difficult journey and a car full of children and not realised their daughter was missing. The report I read says they realised after 90 minutes when they heard the appeal on the news, so would have had to travel the 90 minutes back as well.
I can't imagine doing this myself, not leaving my son in the car as a baby or leaving him by the side of the road now, but I can at least empathise and accept we don't know all the facts yet, just the bare bones which might not be fully correct.
But not in this case, not from the article I linked to. I can't understand or empathise with this or understand why they said there were no signs of neglect.
You just can't expect a seven month old or a two year old to be left for fourteen and a half hours without a nappy change, without needing a drink, without wanting to be fed, without just being awake and needing the attention of their parents because they are babies. Babies don't last that long without needing something.
I don't know what he was thinking when he got up at 12 noon and didn't go to even look at those children, or why she stayed in bed for two hours longer. He must have known at 12 noon that there would be wet nappies to deal with, and that the children would be hungry and thirsty, and yet he didn't even check on the children and notice one was gone.
Not unless it's a regular occurrence for the parents to sleep this late and leave them hungry and thirsty with dirty nappies, which to me is neglect even if the baby hadn't been left to die in the car.
The father in FATE's article seems to be completely different in his situation, and I feel very sorry for him. But this is the story that haunts me whenever an incident like this is reported.