California Nanny Makes Serious Claims Against Employer

Imagine working at job in which you weren’t allowed to take breaks for days at a time. Now, imagine that you have a medical condition that makes it difficult to keep to a schedule like that. Those are the claims that a 64-year-old woman is making against a California couple for whom she was employed.

The woman has been nicknamed the “nightmare nanny” by the media because she is refusing to leave the home of the family. She asserts that she was being exploited by the couple because she was forced to watch the couple’s three children for days on end without taking breaks.

She says that she has taken two days off because of being sick with chronic pulmonary disease, but that the rest of the days she has been employed, she has been watching the children, washing dishes and doing chores.

The nanny was hired by the family in March to care for the children and help around the house in exchange for room and board. The couple says that she stopped doing her job within weeks of being hired, but that she refuses to move out of their home.

It has been reported that the woman threatened to file a wrongful termination claim and sue for elder abuse. Despite that, they started the process to evict the nanny from their home through the court system.

Only time will tell how this situation is ultimately resolved. If this is a case of wrongful termination because of the woman’s medical condition or any other reason, the nanny might opt to follow through on the threat to sue. Those who are facing a similar situation in which they were terminated wrongfully might decide to do the same thing.

Source: Reuters, “California so-called ‘nightmare nanny’ says was exploited by family,” July 1, 2014