Maybe you’ve heard the story of live-in “monster nanny” Diane Stretton, who refused to move out of her employer’s Upland, California, home after she was fired more than a month ago. This was after Stretton just stopped taking care of the family’s children. The police refused to get involved because they deemed it a civil matter. Finally, Stretton has agreed to leave, but only if the family meets her list of demands, which includes a budget for food, access to the house, and mandatory times the family must leave her alone in the house.
But this is not Stretton’s first rodeo:
Although there is no record of a similar case involving employment as a nanny, PEOPLE has found Stretton’s name attached to more than a dozen cases in three Southern California counties ranging from nonpayment to property damage to negligence. Of the 13 cases found by PEOPLE dating back to 2002, she is a plaintiff in 7 cases and a defendant in 6 more. ABC News reports that she is listed by California Courts as a vexatious litigant for abusing the legal system.
This is why you don’t get everything off of Craigslist, people.
Team Blackness also discussed Georgia’s new expansive gun rights laws, Katt Williams’ latest kerfuffle, and a Fox News anchor who can’t understand why women are so “hysterical” about the Hobby Lobby ruling.
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Baud
How come your posts always appear in between two earlier posted posts?
ranchandsyrup
We’ve had good luck with care.com. They background check.
rikyrah
Don’t feel bad for the family. They moved someone into their HOME without investigating that person.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@rikyrah: It does indeed appear that they brought this trouble down on themselves. So I have less sympathy for them than I would for someone who’d done due diligence and got burned.
Hank
Can’t they just wait for her to go out to buy toilet paper or food and then change the locks while she’s gone?
Starfish
@Hank: My understanding was that she was eating their food.
Also, they were doing the whole thing wrong, and she could claim that she was being wrongfully evicted since they were trying to do a direct exchange of childcare for housing and not actually paying her.
J.D. Rhoades
How the hell is this not trespassing?
Lolis
I have the perfect roommate now. I found him on Craigslist. I do background/employment checks though.
kc
@rikyrah:
They were probably dressed provocatively, too.
billb
Step One – move out for a month
Step Two – call the exterminator, tent the building
Step Three- spray bug poison inside
\\I bet she is gone.
NonyNony
@Starfish:
Let me guess – they also didn’t have a formal employment contract with the woman.
My sympathy for these folks – which didn’t start out all that high considering they were finding someone to watch their kids on CraigsList and apparently didn’t get a background check – is dwindling. Feel bad for their kids though – really bad.
@billb:
She’d sue. As it says in the article:
Seriously – just evict her, pay the $1000 fine plus your own lawyer fees and make sure you learn from this goddamn experience to never hire someone to watch your kids without doing a background check or working through an agency/service that does background checks.
Because this story could have been a whole lot worse than “lawsuit happy woman refuses to leave your house”.
Brother Dingaling
For what it’s worth, the family was not paying her a salary. This is illegal.
namekarB
Labor agreements like this and people who work for cash under the table have a huge direct impact on the Social Security Trust Fund. Consider the number of gardeners, housekeepers and contractors who work for cash. Neither the employer nor the employee make Social Security contributions and are therefore indirectly stealing from those who do make SS contributions.
* Disclaimer * I am as guilty as others since I recently paid a worker in cash to replace a couple of rotting fence posts in my back yard .
Crouchback
OK, the article says the nanny has been out of the house for a few days and the family wants to leave town to go to a wedding. For God’s sake, change the locks and suck up the eviction fee if you have to. Better than finding out the house got burned down. I have agree with everyone saying the family is too stupid to be sympathetic.
Tyro
@Brother Dingaling: Fascinating what kind of crazies you end up with when you’re not willing to pay any money for work.