Parents are reliant on daycare providers, babysitters, and nannies to look after their children while away from home. Overall, these services are carried out seamlessly and in good faith.But these accounts of criminal nannies, babysitters who murdered, and daycares that severely endangered children should remind every mom and dad out there to always check references and turn on the nanny cam. Because sometimes, childcare workers and organizations are just plain bad, and trusting the wrong one could harm your babies, or even get them killed.
Daycare Worker Horrors and Childcare Scams, other, True crime, true stories,
Amelia Dyer
Amelia Dyer was a "baby farmer" — that is, she assumed responsibility for infants for money, either because their mothers could not afford or could not be bothered to care for the children themselves. "Baby farmer" was a negative term applied to women like her, because it was generally implied that some forms of abuse or neglect would occur while under a baby farmer's "care."
As it was more profitable for the farmers if the infants simply died, many farmers would take a large but "reasonable" lump sum for the babies, then simply leave the children to starve to death in their homes. Dyer took things one step further — as soon as she admitted an infant into her home, she would murder the child right then and there, generally by wrapping dressmaking tape around their necks and strangling them. Over a twenty-year period, it is believed Dyer killed over 400 babies, though she was only tried and hanged for the murder of one.
John Burbine
The layers of sickness surrounding this story are staggering. John Burbine was arrested and held without bail in 2012 on allegations of sexual abuse and misconduct with thirteen young children, some as young as eight days (!!!) old. He allegedly filmed these encounters. Worse than this, Burbine apparently accessed these children through an unlicensed daycare and tutoring "school" he ran with his wife, Marian, who is currently under house arrest for reckless endangerment of children.
Whether or not Marian was aware of her husband's abuse is unclear, though one suspects she did, particularly considering the fact that Burbine was already a registered sex offender before these most recent allegations. He was previously convicted of indecent assault of a minor in 1989. Burbine committed suicide by hanging himself in his jail cell in 2014 before he could go to trial.
Care.com's "Wheelchair Con"
This time, it isn't the sitter doing bad things, but the potential employer — who doesn't actually exist. The website Care.com is designed to connect babysitters and nannies looking for work with parents looking to hire caretakers for their children. But of course, this is the Internet we're talking about, so it follows that people would attempt to use the site as a tool for cons, scams, and grifts.
ABC News 7 in San Francisco detailed once such attempt, in which student Lauren Well signed up with Care.com in the hopes of getting a few babysitting gigs. She received an unbelievable job offer almost straightaway, which promised to pay $18 an hour to care for the wheelchair-bound son of a deaf woman who was moving to San Francisco in the coming weeks. The woman also stated that she had recently lost her husband and baby daughter in a car accident, and her son was the only survivor. Well was touched by the woman's story, and said she'd love to take the job.
Almost immediately, the woman responded to Well, telling her she was hired without ever meeting her. This raised some warning flags for Well, but she accepted the position. Later Well received a check for $3,000, with instructions to keep $300 herself and use the rest to purchase a new wheelchair. Still undaunted, Well deposited the check and readied to quit her job, when the bank informed her the check wouldn't deposit for three weeks. Then, the woman contacted Well, explaining she was currently experiencing financial hardships, and wondered if she could have a $500 loan. At this point, Well realized the whole thing was a scam and ceased all contact with the "woman." She alerted Care.com, who confirmed that many others had complained about the scam.
Minnesota Day-Care Fraud
It's not just children and parents who suffer at the hands of nannies and daycare centers. Sometimes, the state takes on the brunt of daycare fraud. This was exactly the case in Hennepin County, Minnesota in 2015, when three daycare facilities were raided and four employees were arrested on charges of overbilling the state.
See, these businesses were set up to assist low-income families, and as such they received subsidies through a state-funded program. Rochelle Olson of The Star Tribune in Minneapolis wrote: "The centers are accused of overbilling the state’s Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) by claiming that they cared for more children than were actually present. For example, during a two-week span at the end of last year, Minnesota Child Care Services billed the state for 2,183 children, while a video revealed that no more than 1,233 children were actually attending — a difference of 950 children." Not only this, some of the daycare centers in question were also "cited for violations related to record-keeping, staff qualifications, hazards and cleanliness."
Video Allegedly Shows Nanny Smothering a Child
Moriah Gonzales, a 20-year-old babysitter in California, was caught on film smothering a 13-month-old boy to keep him from crying. According to an article by Melanie Woodrow from ABC News 7 in San Francisco, "Gonzales was attempting to calm the baby. When she placed her hands closer to the baby's face, his cries went from clear and audible to muffled. The baby began to squirm and kick and then went limp. When Gonzales moved her hand away, the baby began crying again. She then put him in his crib and left the room." When questioned by police, Gonzales reportedly gave a statement that was completely inconsistent with the contents of the video. She now faces charges of child abuse, and police are attempting to find evidence of other victims.
Nanny Accused of Beheading Little Girl
This story hit the news in February of 2016, and it served as a sickening reminder of the human heart's darkest corridors. Citizens of Moscow near a downtown metro station were shocked when a woman, Gyulchekhra Bobokulova, clad in a black hijab, began pacing around the station entrance, screaming "Allahu Akbar!" (God is great). She also claimed to have a bomb and threatened to blow herself up. While these words and this behavior were distressing in their own right, the scene was most disturbing for what Bobokulova carried in her hands—the severed head of a four year-old girl. It was later revealed that Bobokulova was the girl's nanny, and earlier that day she had beheaded the child and set fire to the apartment where the girl and her family lived. Currently, Bobokulova is under psychiatric observation to determine whether or not she truly understands the severity of her actions. Several observers took video of the incident. (Warning: Graphic)
Couple Planned to Open Daycare In Order to Drug and Assault Children
Bebars Baslan and Kristen Henry of Brooklyn had been plotting to open a daycare so that the couple could reportedly drug children with Dramamine and molest them, according to an article by Sarah Wallace from ABC 7 Eyewitness News in New York. Fortunately, the couple was busted in a hotel room by the FBI, which had orchestrated a sting operation after Baslan and Henry's plan came to their attention. Though they pleaded "not guilty," the feds apparently have audio recordings of the couple speaking with an informant, in which Baslan is heard discussing his plans to have a family: "She is dying for me to have a baby with her for us to whatever." Nauseating.
Babysitter Caught on Camera Tossing, Knocking Over Infant
It's a familiar narrative: a family hires a caretaker for their children, believing his or her credentials to be solid, and that they would "never in a million years" harm a child. But then mysterious bruises begin to appear on their baby, prompting the family to install a hidden "nanny cam," which then reveals horrid abuse and neglect.
That was exactly the story that emerged in Jacksonville, Florida in 2010. The babysitter in question, Jeannine Campbell, was shown "slinging the child into a playpen, hitting him in the head with a ball and a towel, slapping and kicking him and swatting him 11 times," according to a Florida-Times Union article by Paul Pinkham. Campbell pleaded guilty to all charges, stating that she was angry with the mother and father, and that she took this frustration out on their child. This YouTube video from an un-sourced local news report shows much of Campbell's abuse in detail.
Babysitter Accused of Burning Child and Ripping Out Her Hair
31 year-old Lidia Quilligana was arrested in April of 2015 on charges of first-degree assault, risk of injury to a minor and criminal mischief after a "nanny cam" video reportedly emerged that showed the woman striking, stomping, and intentionally burning a three-year old, reported Fox affialate WFSB in Conecticut. Reports also indicated the babysitter abused the child's one year-old sibling as well, and that she may have ripped hair from both children's heads. In March of 2016, Quilligana (who pled "not guilty" to all charges) was offered a plea deal, though details of the deal have yet to emerge.
Staggering Abuses in Uganda "Monster Nanny" Case
This case is complicated, because it not only involves the physical abuse of a child, but also the subsequent assault of the offending nanny by the child's father, which opens up issues of law and order and gender inequality in Uganda. Video of Jolly Tumuhirwe surfaced in 2014, which showed the nanny throwing, slapping, kicking and stomping an 18-month-old girl.
When the child's father, Erick Kamanzi, saw the footage, he "beat [Tumuhirwe] to a pulp," according to The Daily Mail. Kamanzi was initially arrested for assaulting Tumuhirwe, but all charges were dropped once police viewed the nanny cam footage. Not only this, but Tumuhirwe, who was charged with torture, was denied legal representation during her trial, and was sentenced to four years in prison.
While Tumuhirwe's actions are indeed horrible, the fact that she effectively became a non-person following the incident is highly problematic, especially when considering that women hold a decidedly low social status in Uganda as it is. Add to this the fact that, according to the nanny, Kamanzi denied her early pay so she could contribute to her dying father's health care costs, while his wife constantly accused Tumuhirwe of stealing and generally did not make life easy for her. Not to mention, sites like The Daily Mail and numerous others included the leaked nanny cam video, but few included the footage of Kamanzi beating Tumuhirwe, which is just as readily viewable and equally disturbing. Again, this is not to say that the reasons leading up to Tumuhirwe's beating of the child should justify her actions, but at the very least it should make us aware that she is, at the end of the day, still a person.