Nationwide — Winter Jones, a 6-year-old African American girl from Memphis, died after she was left inside a daycare bus on a hot summer day. The child, who was nonverbal and autistic, was found unresponsive hours after the bus returned to her daycare.
Winter’s father, Bryan Jones, dropped her off at Kid University on Thursday morning. He expected the daycare to take her to Macon Hall Elementary as planned. The daycare bus arrived at the school, but Winter apparently never got off. The vehicle later returned to Kid University, with Winter still inside.
Staff eventually found the 6-year-old unresponsive in the bus during the afternoon. Memphis police confirmed the incident, and Winter was taken to a hospital, where she later died. Jones said his daughter’s internal body temperature reached 109 degrees Fahrenheit. Temperatures in Memphis climbed to about 97 degrees that day.
He remembers Winter as a lively child who loved to sing, dance, play with stuffed animals and swim. He said he had been looking forward to watching her grow up. “She was so full of life and I was excited to see how her life was going to turn out,” Jones told Action News 5. “But the worst part of it is…I won’t ever know. It’s just hard to deal with.”
Aimee Joyner, executive director of the Harwood Center, said children who are nonverbal and autistic require frequent checks because they may not be able to alert others when something is wrong. “So if someone is not able to verbalize,” Joyner said, “you have to set up that environment for more checks and balances because that child is not going to be able to say ‘hey, I’m back here, someone left me on the bus.”
Memphis Police, the Tennessee Department of Human Services and the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services are investigating Winter’s death. Officials have also contacted Memphis-Shelby County Schools to ask why staff at Macon Hall Elementary did not raise concerns when Winter failed to arrive, but no response has been given. Meanwhile, Kid University remained closed the following day, with no comment from its director.
Winter’s family has started a GoFundMe campaign to help cover expenses. It has so far raised over $16,000.