BY Richard Reeve, Stephen TschidaWJLA | Sinclair Broadcast Group 
 
 WASHINGTON — A Northwest D.C. couple faces cruelty of children charges, after police say two toddlers were left alone in a parked car Saturday, its heat and engine turned off. 
 
 "I thought it was really sad," says Mary Kate O'Connell, who lives near the corner of 23rd and l streets, where the youngsters were first spotted by a witness. 
 
 
 
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 "If I saw kids in a car on the street, I would definitely want to do something about it," she adds. 
 
 The witness saw the children inside a parked, locked Volvo around 4:30 p.m. The outside temperature was 28 degrees. 
 
 "It's probably not the most parentally sound decision," says Tom, a District resident who didn't want to give his last name. 
 
 "Obviously, that seems irresponsible," says Dui Nguien, who lives nearby. 
 
 But that wasn't all. 
 
 The manager of the ‘Ris' restaurant confirms the children's caregivers, identified by police as 45-year-old Jennie Chang, and 41-year-old Christophe Lucas, were inside attending a wine tasting. 
 
 Police say the children were inside the car for an hour. 
 
 "It's the same thing if you leave your kids in a hot car in the summer," says O'Connell. "I mean, the weather is terrible." 
 
 Arriving officers located Chang and Lucas, and booked them at Second District headquarters on second-degree cruelty to children charges. 
 
 "For a wine tasting?," Tom says. "Hopefully you have enough income to afford a babysitter, so why not just get the babysitter?" 
 
 No one answered at the couple's Northwest D.C. townhouse. Neighbors expressed surprise. They say Chang and Lucas are attentive, caring parents. 
 
 The children are now being held by Child Protective Services. 
 
 "I don't think it's right," O'Connell says. "I don't know why they wouldn't just bring the kids inside." 
 
 The charges against the couple are serious. 
 
 Under D.C. law, second-degree cruelty to children occurs when a person is accused of "mistreating a child" or allegedly engages in conduct causing "grave risk'"of bodily injury to a child. 
 
 If convicted, Chang and Lucas could each face $10,000 in fines and/or 10 years in prison. 
 
 "I hope there's some disciplinary action, and it doesn't happen again," Nguien says. "Glad there were some people that caught it." 
 
 Chang and Lucas faced a judge Monday in D.C. Superior Court. They were released on their own recognizance and fled from court when ABC7 attempted to ask them questions. 
 
 Lucas told investigators he had left a cell phone on inside the car to monitor the children, and that he and Chang kept an eye on the vehicle. 
 
 
 
 Source: WJLA 
 
 ||||| A couple who left their two toddlers alone in a car on a Northwest Washington street while they attended a wine-tasting at an upscale restaurant was monitoring them with a cellphone left in the vehicle, law enforcement officials said Monday. 
 
 Police said the children — a 22-month-old boy and a slightly older girl — were strapped in car seats and wearing coats when they were found Saturday afternoon near the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, in the 1100 block of 23rd Street NW. Neither child had gloves or a hat, police said, and the younger one did not have shoes or socks. The girl was “hysterically crying,” according to a police report. 
 
 The temperature was 35 degrees, and police said the doors were locked and the windows were rolled up. Police said the father and mother were at the restaurant Ris, about 400 feet around the corner, in the 2200 block of L Street. The father, Christopher Daniel Lucas, who also goes by Christophe, told police that he left an iPhone in the car with an open connection to the children’s mother, Jennie Teresa Chang. The restaurant’s manager told police that the couple was at a wine tasting for about an hour, according to a police report. 
 
 “I left to go inside the restaurant,” Lucas said, according to the report, “but I’m watching them.” Police said the phone line had been open 58 minutes when officers arrived and got the children out of the gray Volvo station wagon and into a warm police car. 
 
 Lucas, 41, and Chang, 46, who live in a $1 million rowhouse near Dupont Circle, about a 10-minute walk from the restaurant, were arrested and charged with two counts of attempted second-degree cruelty to children, which carries a maximum 10-year prison sentence. They spent Saturday and Sunday night in a precinct lockup until their initial appearance in court Monday afternoon. Both identified themselves to police as the children’s parents. 
 
 A D.C. Superior Court judge ordered Lucas and Chang released pending a hearing Feb. 18. The judge ordered them to stay away from the toddlers. Neither responded to questions from a reporter as they left the court building after the hearing. 
 
 Court files show the couple intends to hire their own lawyers. The documents say that Lucas is originally from France and works as a software engineer and that Chang is employed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. 
 
 The children were checked out by paramedics and were in good health, police said. They were turned over to D.C. Child and Family Services. 
 
 The initial call about the children came to police about 4:30 p.m. that day by a State Department lawyer who lives in a condominium above where the car was parked. He told police he watched the car for 20 minutes and called when no one showed up. 
 
 Police said surveillance video from the Ritz-Carlton shows that no one approached the car from the time the couple left until police arrived. Police said video surveillance from the hotel shows the Volvo “parked in the location it had been discovered” starting about 3:38 p.m. “The occupants exited the car” eight minutes later, police said, and the video showed that “no one approached the vehicle from the time the children were left unattended until the time police arrived.” 
 
 Lucas showed up at the car as police were investigating, according to the report, and told them he did not leave them for long. “The children were sleeping, so I went inside,” he told the officers. ||||| A couple was arrested Jan. 31, 2015, when police found their two young child left in an unattended car while they attended a wine-tasting in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Getty Images) 
 
 WASHINGTON — Two children younger than 2 were left in an unattended car while their parents went to a wine tasting, police said. 
 
 Christopher Lucas, 41, and Jennie Chang, 45, of the District of Columbia were charged with second-degree cruelty to children after police received a call Saturday from a woman who walked by and saw an abandoned child in a locked Volvo near a Ritz Carlton Hotel. 
 
 Two children, a 22-month-old boy and a 2½-year-old girl, were restrained in child seats inside the car, according to charging documents. The girl was crying hysterically; the boy was not upset. 
 
 Outside the temperature was 35 degrees, and neither were wearing gloves or hats, police said. 
 
 As officers assessed how they would get into the car, Lucas approached and began to unlock the doors. 
 
 "I left to go inside the restaurant, but I was watching them," he told officers. Then Lucas reached inside the Volvo and pulled out a cellphone that showed a call to Chang and a timer that showed 58 minutes. "The children were sleeping, so I went inside." 
 
 The parents had gone inside a nearby restaurant for a wine tasting, said Gwendolyn Crump, Metropolitan Police Department spokeswoman. The children were left alone for about an hour. 
 
 When Chang arrived at the car a short time later she asked officers at the scene, "What is the problem?" according to the charging documents. 
 
 An ambulance was called to the scene, the children were examined and they were taken into protective custody. 
 
 Lucas and Chang pleaded not guilty at an arraignment Monday and a judge has ordered them to stay away from their children. Their next hearing is scheduled Feb. 18. If they are found guilty of second-degree cruelty, each could face a fine of up to $25,000 and up to 10 years in prison. 
 
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– Two DC parents were arrested over the weekend after police say they left their two toddlers locked in a car while they attended a wine-tasting at a posh restaurant, the Washington Post reports. Cops say they received a call about the kids on Saturday afternoon and found the 22-month-old boy and 2-1/2-year-old girl, who was "crying hysterically," strapped into their car seats with coats but no hats or gloves; the temperature outside was about 35 degrees, WUSA-TV reports. Christopher Lucas (who also goes by Christophe, according to various sources) and his wife, Jennie Chang, were sampling inside for about an hour, restaurant staff said in the police report, and one of their smartphones—which they say they left in the car with an open connection so they could monitor the children—had had an open line for 58 minutes, the Post notes. Lucas reportedly came outside as police tried to figure out how to get the kids out of the Volvo. "I left to go inside ... but I was watching them," he told cops, as per WUSA. "The children were sleeping." Lucas, said in court docs to be a software engineer, and Chang, employed by the FDA, reportedly live in a $1 million rowhouse near Dupont Circle. They were arrested for attempted second-degree child cruelty, which carries a maximum 10-year prison sentence and up to $10,000 in fines. The kids are OK, the Post notes, and with DC child services. A woman who lives near where the car was found tells WJLA, "It's the same thing if you leave your kids in a hot car in the summer. I mean, the weather is terrible." Meanwhile, another DC resident tells the station he's similarly baffled. "Why not just get [a] babysitter?" he asks. (Maybe the parents should've just gone to a virtual wine-tasting.)