A woman who allegedly left her 2-year-old daughter in a car for up to five hours with the heat on while she drank herself to sleep in a friend’s vehicle was behind bars Thursday on $1 million bail on a murder charge.
Lacey Mazzarella, 34, was arrested at about 8:20 p.m. Wednesday and booked at the sheriff’s Carson Station, the Sheriff’s Information Bureau reported.
Deputies responded to the 22400 block of South Vermont Avenue in an unincorporated area of Torrance Sept. 23 regarding an infant not breathing and found June Love Augosto unresponsive, said Deputy Juanita Navarro-Suarez of the Sheriff’s Information Bureau.
Mazzarella, who was at the location, was interviewed along with several witnesses, Navarro-Suarez said.
June was later pronounced dead at an area hospital, according to the coroner’s office.
Mazzarella told a sheriff’s detective that around 11:30 p.m. Sept. 22, she placed Augosto in her car seat and turned up the heat in the car, which was parked near a residence in the 22400 block of South Vermont Avenue, ABC7 reported.
Mazzarella then allegedly left the 2-year-old inside the hot car and went to another vehicle, where she sat and drank alcohol with a friend. At some point, Mazzarella fell asleep, ABC7 reported.
She is due in a Compton courtroom Friday.
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