An Indianapolis, IN woman was forced to fire her babysitter after seeing a cell phone video showing gallons of water being dumped on the tiny 7-month-old.
The incident happened Wednesday at the splash pad on Lincoln Street in Greenwood, Indiana.
Mom, Brittany Dixson, said she was mortified after seeing the video at work, and realizing it was her daughter Annora. The woman who posted the video on Facebook was Desiree Howell, and she was concerned for the well-being of the baby and what she witnessed.
“Every cell in my body wanted to go grab that baby and keep her safe but the way people are these days you never know what could have happened,” Howell told IndyStar in a message via Facebook.
Howell said she watched the babysitter make the child walk on hot pavement, swing her too high and put the baby’s face directly in a sprinkler. She posted the video while waiting for the police to arrive.
“When I first saw the video it was just like why would you put a child underneath so much water at once?” mom, Dixson said in an interview with News 8. When Dixson confronted her babysitter, she said she apologized profusely.
“She was basically apologizing to me the whole time telling me how she’s so sorry, she really didn’t know that was the bucket that had the most water in it that dumped on her,” Dixson said.
“You allow that to happen,” she asked the babysitter. “You allow to let her walk on her barefoot on the hot cement, you swing her high up on the swing multiple times,” she said. Dixon ultimately fired the sitter, and now she doesn’t think she can trust anyone with her baby ever again.
“It’s terrifying to think that somebody could do something to your daughter, somebody you trust to watch your daughter at any moment of time,” said Dixson.
Worried about her daughter, Dixson took her to the emergency room to get checked out, and doctors told her Annora could have had dry drowning.
“She could have inhaled so much water once she went to sleep that night she could have actually drowned in her sleep because the water would have been trapped in her lungs,” she said. “But she didn’t have any water in her lungs or anything like that but he said that was a major possibility and he’s glad that I brought her in.”
WISH-TV could not reach the babysitter for her side of the story, but the Greenwood Police Department and the Department of Child Services are now investigating the incident.
Do you think this babysitter intended to hurt the child or was it just an act of poor judgement?
Let us know in the comments and please SHARE this story with your friends and family on Facebook!
[Featured Image Credit: Facebook / Desiree Howell]
Mom Fires Babysitter After Gallons Of Water Dumped On Her 7-Month-Old is an article from: LifeDaily