Inset, top to bottom: Sebastian Gardner and Scott Gardner (Volusia County Sheriff’s Office). Background: The bar where Scott Gardner drank while his son died (Google Maps).
A 34-year-old father in Florida will spend several decades behind bars for killing his 18-month-old son, leaving the toddler locked in a scorching truck for more than three hours while he got a haircut and went drinking at a local bar.
Scott Allen Gardner pleaded no contest to one count each of second-degree murder, aggravated child abuse and aggravated child neglect in the death of young Sebastian Gardner, records show. A Volusia County judge subsequently sentenced him to 42 years in a state correctional facility. In exchange for his plea, prosecutors dropped a charge of first-degree murder.
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Gardner was arrested in June 2025 after investigators determined he left his 18-month-old son, Sebastian, alone in a hot pickup truck for more than three hours on June 6, 2025.
According to a news release from the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office, Gardner left the toddler strapped into his car seat inside the truck “while Gardner got a haircut and then went drinking inside Hanky Panky’s Lounge.”
Investigators said Gardner repeatedly gave detectives false accounts of what happened before his arrest.
“It was estimated by medical personnel that Sebastian’s body temperature reached 111 degrees during this tragedy,” the sheriff’s office wrote in the release.
Authorities said Gardner first stopped at Classic Cuts for a haircut before heading to the bar in Ormond-by-the-Sea, where he drank a bottle of beer and a shot of Fireball, the Daytona Beach News-Journal reported, citing a probable cause affidavit. Around 1 p.m., he briefly stepped outside to check on a bartender’s vehicle at her request before returning inside for another beer and another shot.
Gardner did not call 911 until about 2:45 p.m.
When an Ormond Beach police officer arrived, first responders were reportedly unable to open Sebastian’s mouth to establish an airway for CPR because rigor mortis appeared to have already set in.
The toddler was pronounced dead after being transported to a local hospital, where an emergency-room physician concluded he had been dead for “some time” — more than an hour — and noted that Gardner smelled of alcohol, the News-Journal reported.
Sheriff Mike Chitwood previously said investigators determined Sebastian was likely dead for one to two hours before anyone sought emergency help. Authorities also alleged that after the child’s death, Gardner and his mother returned to the same bar and remained there drinking until around midnight, according to a report from Orlando Fox affiliate WOFL.
During Thursday’s sentencing hearing, Sebastian’s mother reportedly described her son as a fighter with “a beautiful smile,” bright blue eyes and “a silly little laugh that could fill a room.”
“The short 18 months I had with Sebastian will never be enough but I cherish every single minute we shared together,” she said, according to WOFL. “It hurts beyond words to know that his life was cut terribly short and that I left grieving all the milestones we will never get to see.”
Addressing Gardner directly, she added: “Scott, I carry a lot of anger for what you took from us. You took away a sweet and innocent life, and you shattered a family.”
She concluded by telling him, “For my own heart and for my boys, I forgive you.”
Gardner has remained in custody without bond since his June 2025 arrest.
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