Clearly there's more to this story and mom just isn't giving up the details. Like, a nanny isn't likely to box stuff up and give it to GoodWill for absolutely no reason at all. If she were stealing it, why would the nanny have told her anything at all, why not just ghost her?
I think mom told the nanny to box up the stuff that doesn't fit the kid anymore and donate it, and the nanny has little common sense and donated almost everything without discernment.
My mom helped me box stuff up for Goodwill in the very early stages of her yet to be diagnosed dementia. It ended about like this story. She took the wrong boxes to Goodwill and everything. I'd be very interested in the age of the babysitter.
I don't really think it's a lack of common sense (assuming she was told to box stuff up). A nanny that watches a kid for a couple hours twice a week almost certainly wouldn't know that a random sweater the kid has never worn around her was a special hand me down. If OP gave her the direction to box up what didn't fit then it's fully on OP for not separating out the special stuff beforehand.
Oh, I didn't mean to blame the nanny, really. Lack of common sense being to ask about homemade things, but it's ENTIRELY on LAOP to have separated those things out, been more specific, gone through the things, or simply done it herself if it was important. You can't ask someone to help you with a project, give no oversight and then be upset when they couldn't read your mind.
So I was a nanny, and several times the parents said "box everything up they don't wear and donate it, I don't even want to see it" and it's like, ma'am, your kids wear one outfit on repeat, I have to pry off then kicking and screaming to wash.
But I used sound judgement and just packed up the too small Carter's rejects, not the hand made sweater grandma wore when she was a baby, and not the current fits.
Joe Moore: Anybody can get the goods. The hard part's getting away.
Bergman: Uh-huh.
Joe Moore: You plan a good enough getaway, you could steal location bots.
Bergman: Location bots're gone.
Joe Moore: What did I tell you?
I’m seeking legal guidance regarding a situation with a former babysitter/nanny in Illinois.
On Friday, December 12, 2025, while working in my home, the babysitter went through my daughter’s dresser, closet, and cart and removed all 12-month and 18-month clothing, along with pajamas, sleep sacks, towels, robes, receiving blankets, and custom embroidered blankets belonging to both of my children. These items were placed into a diaper box and a garbage bag and donated to Goodwill without my knowledge or permission.
This occurred during extreme winter weather (approximately 5°F). As a result, my infant had no clothing aside what what she was wearing and what was in our bedroom, and I spent the following two days urgently trying to replace essentials while dealing with significant stress and disruption to my family. She did buy a few small things from Target and stopped it off but it doesn’t even come close to what she stole from my home.
I have video footage of her removing items from my home, which has been provided to police, and I have filed a police report. Police say this isn’t criminal bc she apologized and went to Target to try and replace some items. She has acknowledged taking the items but is characterizing it as a “mistake.” I do not agree with that characterization.
Many of the items have sentimental value (custom embroidered blankets and hand-me-downs from my son), making it difficult to assign a monetary value.
My questions: • Is this considered theft or conversion under Illinois law, even if she claims she intended to “help”? • If the items cannot be recovered, can I legally demand payment for their value, and how is value determined when items are sentimental? • What additional steps should I be taking (civil demand letter, small claims, etc.)?
Any insight from attorneys or those familiar with Illinois law would be appreciated.
I don't understand how the nanny felt it was ok to take and donate ALL the baby clothes. It really feels like there's something else hinky going on here, but we're not being told what.
Especially because of her saying "Police say this isn’t criminal bc she apologized and went to Target to try and replace some items. She has acknowledged taking the items but is characterizing it as a “mistake.”"
Police aren't going to say "this isn't criminal because she apologized". That's not how the law works.
I think the real clue is in OP saying she called it a "mistake". It was probably a "mistake" borne from OP telling her to box up and donate stuff and not being specific.
edit - oh yeah for sure this is what I think, because of this comment -
"She’s saying it was a mistake. But someone can’t be this stupid. The police read my text chain and said since she’s trying to fix it by contacting Goodwill, this isn’t criminal."
So there was a text chain that concluded by the babysitter saying it was a mistake and she'd contact goodwill, this definitely reads like a conversation was had about donating but wasn't super clear, leading to this mistake.
I find it hard to imagine that most police departments would do anything when the claim is "I told her to box up clothes and get rid of them, and she boxed up some clothes I didn't want taken".
Police aren't going to say "this isn't criminal because she apologized". That's not how the law works.
But they will raise an eyebrow at a woman yelling about her nanny donating clothes on accident and not take it seriously. Especially when some of the clothes were able to be recouped from the goodwill and the nanny tried to buy new replacement clothes.
The police not caring is the most believable part of the story to me.
you're probably not wrong. fake and AI generated posts with nutty stories engineered for maximum engagement that generate karma for reddit accounts that can then be sold is a huge problem
reddit accounts that started off as real can appear more credible for promoting all kinds of things, from subtly shilling products to propaganda operations that work to shit political opinions. if you control a few different legit looking accounts with decent karma, you can sway entire threads and subs. if you search reddit about it there are some interesting threads that go into more detail.
edited to add: in recent years for instance I've seen the politics of several major city subs I'm on shift substantially. if these types of accounts can start to post frequently, upvote / downvote, get mod roles, suddenly they have a huge platform to make whatever politics they want to push "seem" like normal opinions of your "neighbors."
Reddit also made it easier for these accounts to go unnoticed with their new "privacy" features. Accounts can hide their post history now so as long as they have positive karma and a decent age they can look real even if their history is a load of nonsense.
That said it doesn't seem like all the karma farmers have cottoned on to this yet.
If you put a single space in the search bar on their account page and search, it unhides all their posts and comments. The privacy feature can be side stepped with literally two clicks.
I think they are satisfied with it the way it is now. They're aware of how easy it is to bypass. It gives the illusion of privacy, which is all they were after I think.
Tbh I only enabled it to keep people from following me to unrelated subreddits to argue in comments about trees and being obnoxious to other subs' mods.
People just can't handle the truth (that deep planting MM.111 apple rootstock has been shown to be safe & effective in multiple university trials, even placing the graft union below the soil line, and cloned rootstocks do not have a taproot or root crown/flare the way seedlings do anyway). The truth upsets them, and then they need to follow me around to unrelated subreddits being angry about it instead of accepting that sometimes the Root Flare Planting Police is sometimes, in some situations, simply wrong.
I find it hilarious that I've never had the level of people being upset over any far more controversial subjects but apple tree rootstock planting depth really gets them riled up. Turning on the setting seems to be plenty to shut it down though.
If bots can get an account in good standing they can use it to post propaganda on subreddits where new accounts are limited/prevented from posting.
One account by itself won't make a huge difference but if they have 5000 accounts they can have a "conversation" that is highly upvoted (by themselves) and seen by lots of people who will also engage in it, and that can push discourse in whatever direction the person behind the bots wants.
Yup. In the politics subs last year, the trolls would build up their karma by making low-effort posts in sports game day threads. Because when the game is on, and you post "Our team is so cooked!", everyone upvotes! And then they'd come onto the politics subs and push a particular orange candidate and/or the Polymarket odds.
Astroturf, propaganda, and scams. And if the account looks legit and established, it's harder to argue it's not a real person. Several years ago, there was a big thing about people willing to buy reddit accounts for money. And the older and more active they were, the more they would pay for them. And then as time went on, people started figuring out what those sold accounts were being used for. Some people don't care, and then fatten accounts up to be sold anyways.
Reddit accounts post the ads we see on here. Some of the in-line ads look almost like legit posts. I suspect that having higher karma might fool some people into thinking they're real posts and not adbot posts, but I'm not entirely sure. Also, I read an AMA recently by someone who said they were paid by a company to be their social media person who goes online and tries to shittalk competitors and upsetll the company they worked for, without ever saying they worked for them. I guess something like that would also be easier if they could just buy an account that already had tons of history and positive karma.
Negligible. An account with enough karma to post in the bigger subs does have value to advertisers, but it's trivial to get your karma that high. You could sell an entire botnet on the dark net, but for some random account with a few popular posts on legaladvice you wouldn't get near enough money to compensate you for the effort of posting.
Karma farming is a thing, but people do it for parasocial validation or the satisfaction of watching the number go up, like Cookie Clicker. In the old days of vBulletin, before karma and upvotes were invented, people would make pointless posts on "word association" and "let's count to a billion" threads just to increase the postcount underneath their profile pic.
Same. I don't want to say it's fake, but I also don't understand this, and LAOP doesn't provide much clarification.
She says the nanny is claiming it's a mistake, but what was the mistake? Did LAOP tell her to donate things and she donated the wrong things? If it wasn't a mistake, what's the nanny's motivation? Why would she do this?
Even more baffling is that apparently LAOP went to Goodwill, and they did find a few small items. So that apparently shoots down the theory that the nanny lied and sold them. One of the strangest stories I've seen on LA ever. Desperately waiting for an update. Even if the update turns out to be "yeah I made it all up."
I know, I saw that! The nanny, apparently, didn't steal them to sell them or for herself, so why would she do this?? What's her motivation?? It just doesn't make any sense to me.
Edit: My best guess at the moment is that LAOP told the nanny to donate things, and there was a miscommunication of some kind, which is why LAOP has skimped on the details of how/why this occurred: they want it to appear to be a straight up theft, and not acknowledge a grey area of them telling the nanny to do this.
The thing that’s maybe nothing but is itching my brain is she specifies the clothes by age range but doesn’t say how old the baby is. And there are actually two children mentioned?
I was mulling the same thing over. She said that she donated all of her daughter’s 12 and 18 month clothes, plus all of the pajamas and sleep sacks from both children. The sizing is an odd detail to mention unless it’s in some way significant. This story could make sense if the daughter is a toddler who normally wears a 2T with maybe some 18 months items still, and she usually dresses a younger child, still a baby, in pajamas all day and in a sleep sack at night. Especially if the baby is in size 12 months.
That would make this a fairly easy mistake for someone who isn’t very familiar with the household, if they are actively cleaning out the previous two sizes of too small toddler clothes plus a storage closet with blankets and such in it - which would likely include all of the extra sleep sacks, and which is also a very likely place to have stored embroidered receiving blankets. That combination would then make sense of the claim that she was left scrambling for anything at all to keep the baby warm.
She mentions both a daughter and a son, but doesn't mention ages - although references hand-me-downs from the son. So I think the daughter is the younger child, and maybe the 18-month clothes are the hand-me-downs from the son and the 12-month clothes are what the daughter actively wears?
It would maybe explain why the nanny got rid of the 18-month stuff; if it's too small for the son, and big for the daughter, (and looks like 'boy' stuff,) the nanny not have known to keep it.
Even if it was a miscommunication, how could the nanny be so much of an idiot to donate everything including obviously sentimental keepsakes? Either there was one hell of a language barrier, or this may be the dumbest nanny I have heard of in a long time.
I know. It still doesn't really explain it, it's just the only thing I can think of? Like if LAOP was having a bad day and said she wanted to get rid of everything and the nanny took her literally?
Or LAOP says it's not their usual nanny, so maybe she didn't know the family all that well, and thought there was more clothes/items somewhere else and that she wasn't getting rid of all of it? LAOP does say they had stuff in another room, so maybe the nanny thought there was more in that room than there is??
Right now I'm turning over in my head "what if the 'nanny' is actually the OP's mom or MIL, and OP is obscuring that detail." I couldn't see a hired non-relative babysitter doing this, but I could see an overbearing relative doing it, for an assortment of reasons (wants to give the clothes to another baby in the family, wants to replace them with things she likes better, thinks OP is a hoarder in need of intervention, it could be lots of things). It would also go a long way toward why the cops dismissed it.
I like this theory! OP also mentions that this was part time, two days a week, and that it was only "for a few weeks to cover [OP's] extra workload". I could totally see an overbearing relative being asked to pitch in a couple days a week for a few weeks, and then it results in this.
If nanny had a drug problem (or whatever) and wanted to make some extra cash, this wouldn't be the way to do it! And since OP recovered some items from Goodwill, it seems like the "nanny" was telling the truth about donating.
So either overbearing relative, or it's what other people suggested, that there was a miscommunication between OP and the nanny. That would also explain why the police aren't willing to do anything, if the nanny misunderstood what items to donate, but OP did instruct the nanny to donate clothes.
I wonder if the mom said something like “everything here” gesturing to one or two draws or a space in the closet but nanny interpreted it to mean the whole thing.
Right, if we assume that's what happened. If we're taking LAOP's story at face value - which is what I did originally in this comment - then the nanny's motivation doesn't make any sense.
According to LAOP, the nanny - unprompted - cleared out all of the stuff and donated it. Which is why I asked: what's the motivation?
I agree that the nanny being told to donate things and mistakenly donating things seems more likely to me, because LAOP's telling is just bizarre.
I read that comment! They found a few small items but nothing significant. Wth does that even mean LAOP? They found some of the their baby items but not all of them? Not the clothing items that are most significant to the family?
People are trying to get any information out of them that could make this situation make any sense and they're being so vague.
Also, unless these are designer baby clothes, I'm a little skeptical at the idea that someone would bother stealing an entire infant wardrobe to sell. Most baby clothes I see online are either free or being sold for a few quid in bulk. It seems like it would just be a lot of time and effort to individually sell baby outfits for pretty minimal profit.
Maybe I'm wrong! I'm open to being corrected on this. I just think if I was going to steal from my employer to resell something, baby clothes wouldn't be what I'd go for.
I could see someone stealing them for drug money or desperation money. I know I have seen a few street stands in the city with odd items. Things like way too many DVDs for one person to own, school kid clothes, nurse uniforms, and obviously used shoes in way too many sizes for one family. And the seller only accepts cash. Usually these are items that were stolen, and are now being sold for money.
I've even seen cases of people getting on local train lines, and then walking up and down the isles with 5 jackets over their shoulders, trying to sell them. And then if you look closely, you can still see the anti-theft ink bomb devices still attached. So obviously stolen. And these people only go with 5 clothing items at a time.
I've never had or needed a part time temporary nanny so I'm coming at this from a position of complete ignorance but it seems like an odd thing to ask such a person to do.
I know, the whole thing is weird. Like, she specifically says that she considered hand-me-down items to be sentimental - how is a part-time nanny supposed to know that they're sentimental? Why would you trust someone who doesn't really know you to make that call?
I'm also wondering it the sentimental hand me downs were boxed up, which might have made the nanny thing they were boxed up so that they could be given away.
Me neither. They're no way the police would say it's not criminal because she apologized. Courtrooms are full of people who apologized. It makes no sense, I suspect more karma farming.
I think LAOP is leaving important information out. The nanny did go to goodwill, LAOP says they were able to get some of their items back from speaking to the management there. To me, they seem like they are overreacting to an actual mistake.
I am certain OP told the nanny to donate some stuff and there was some misunderstanding along the way. It explains why stuff was actually at Goodwill, and why the police are saying "bro... this isn't really a problem we're going to deal with".
I like the theory someone else in this comment section proposed which is that "the nanny" may well be a family member (mother/MIL?). Feels like that puts together a few of the odd shaped pieces.
A lot of crimes rely on criminal intent to be actual crimes.
Also I doubt the police are interested in charging someone who was told to donate a bunch of stuff (the most likely scenario) for accidentlaly donating some of the wrong things.
Good news, you wouldn't even have time to unroll your sleeping bag before someone came out and told you that everything that didn't go straight on the rack had gone off to a centralised sorting facility and they have no idea where it is now or any way to find out. Thank you, come again.
Yes a grandmother contacted one i worked at and tried to describe new with tags jeans she had donated- no idea how to begin finding them. Even a an old family quilt- no idea but it wasn't kept at store.
LAOP says in one comment that she did find some of the stuff at Goodwill, so it seems like at least some of it was donated. The whole thing makes no sense to me.
My best guess is that LAOP told her to donate things, and was either unclear (eg. told the nanny to box up and donate "everything" but didn't mean everything) and now can't admit fault, or the nanny just simply misunderstood and that's the "mistake" the nanny referred to.
Maybe a language barrier is involved? Or the nanny is very young or much older? It just doesn’t make sense. Why would you donate all the clothes so that the kid had literally nothing to wear?
That, or the LAOP is exaggerating and the nanny just donated all the too small stuff on top of all the keepsakes. It sounds like there’s two kids in the household, maybe they donated the clothes that were too small for the older kid that they were saving for the younger kid but didn’t fit yet?
Who knows. It feels like there’s a lot of details missing here.
Exactly like, there has to be more to the story because, as told, it doesn't make sense.
I think the fact it's not their usual nanny is maybe relevant? Like if LAOP just said something like, "clear out this closet and donate it all," thinking it was obvious that XYZ wasn't included, but since the nanny doesn't really know LAOP/the family she just did it, didn't know what was sentimental, and assumed LAOP had other clothes or whatever, and literally wanted it completely cleared out.
I'm wondering if the nanny was told to donate baby clothes items, so Amelia Bedelia'd it and found all of the baby clothes in the house and donated them.
The fact that OP has been to the goodwill and has had some of the items returned from the back of their storage shows that the nanny didn't just sell the items like so many commenters on LA are assuming.
It does sound like a mistake, and a shitty one, but LAOP seems like they are overreacting by trying to get the nanny arrested.
Anyone else immediately assume the laop stiffed the babysitter? Doesn't fit the facts but explained the title and the vibe. I have no idea what happened, the donation story with no reason behind it makes no sense
I have so many questions.
SO MANY
Clearly there's more to this story and mom just isn't giving up the details. Like, a nanny isn't likely to box stuff up and give it to GoodWill for absolutely no reason at all. If she were stealing it, why would the nanny have told her anything at all, why not just ghost her?
I think mom told the nanny to box up the stuff that doesn't fit the kid anymore and donate it, and the nanny has little common sense and donated almost everything without discernment.
My mom helped me box stuff up for Goodwill in the very early stages of her yet to be diagnosed dementia. It ended about like this story. She took the wrong boxes to Goodwill and everything. I'd be very interested in the age of the babysitter.
I was thinking or a language barrier.
Amelia Bedelia irl
I don't really think it's a lack of common sense (assuming she was told to box stuff up). A nanny that watches a kid for a couple hours twice a week almost certainly wouldn't know that a random sweater the kid has never worn around her was a special hand me down. If OP gave her the direction to box up what didn't fit then it's fully on OP for not separating out the special stuff beforehand.
Oh, I didn't mean to blame the nanny, really. Lack of common sense being to ask about homemade things, but it's ENTIRELY on LAOP to have separated those things out, been more specific, gone through the things, or simply done it herself if it was important. You can't ask someone to help you with a project, give no oversight and then be upset when they couldn't read your mind.
So I was a nanny, and several times the parents said "box everything up they don't wear and donate it, I don't even want to see it" and it's like, ma'am, your kids wear one outfit on repeat, I have to pry off then kicking and screaming to wash.
But I used sound judgement and just packed up the too small Carter's rejects, not the hand made sweater grandma wore when she was a baby, and not the current fits.
Critical thinking is dead on all accounts
Joe Moore: Anybody can get the goods. The hard part's getting away.
Bergman: Uh-huh.
Joe Moore: You plan a good enough getaway, you could steal location bots.
Bergman: Location bots're gone.
Joe Moore: What did I tell you?
I don't understand how the nanny felt it was ok to take and donate ALL the baby clothes. It really feels like there's something else hinky going on here, but we're not being told what.
I don't want to be the guy who cries fake all the time, but I can not believe that this actually happened.
Especially because of her saying "Police say this isn’t criminal bc she apologized and went to Target to try and replace some items. She has acknowledged taking the items but is characterizing it as a “mistake.”"
Police aren't going to say "this isn't criminal because she apologized". That's not how the law works.
I think the real clue is in OP saying she called it a "mistake". It was probably a "mistake" borne from OP telling her to box up and donate stuff and not being specific.
edit - oh yeah for sure this is what I think, because of this comment -
"She’s saying it was a mistake. But someone can’t be this stupid. The police read my text chain and said since she’s trying to fix it by contacting Goodwill, this isn’t criminal."
So there was a text chain that concluded by the babysitter saying it was a mistake and she'd contact goodwill, this definitely reads like a conversation was had about donating but wasn't super clear, leading to this mistake.
So you're telling me you really can't plead oopsie daisies?
I find it hard to imagine that most police departments would do anything when the claim is "I told her to box up clothes and get rid of them, and she boxed up some clothes I didn't want taken".
But they will raise an eyebrow at a woman yelling about her nanny donating clothes on accident and not take it seriously. Especially when some of the clothes were able to be recouped from the goodwill and the nanny tried to buy new replacement clothes.
The police not caring is the most believable part of the story to me.
you're probably not wrong. fake and AI generated posts with nutty stories engineered for maximum engagement that generate karma for reddit accounts that can then be sold is a huge problem
Stupid question but what value does a reddit account have? What would be the value in buying and selling a free account with fake internet points?
reddit accounts that started off as real can appear more credible for promoting all kinds of things, from subtly shilling products to propaganda operations that work to shit political opinions. if you control a few different legit looking accounts with decent karma, you can sway entire threads and subs. if you search reddit about it there are some interesting threads that go into more detail.
edited to add: in recent years for instance I've seen the politics of several major city subs I'm on shift substantially. if these types of accounts can start to post frequently, upvote / downvote, get mod roles, suddenly they have a huge platform to make whatever politics they want to push "seem" like normal opinions of your "neighbors."
Reddit also made it easier for these accounts to go unnoticed with their new "privacy" features. Accounts can hide their post history now so as long as they have positive karma and a decent age they can look real even if their history is a load of nonsense.
That said it doesn't seem like all the karma farmers have cottoned on to this yet.
If you put a single space in the search bar on their account page and search, it unhides all their posts and comments. The privacy feature can be side stepped with literally two clicks.
Damn, I knew it was easily bypassed using a third party search engine but I didn't realise it was that easy. Reddit truly are incompetent.
I think they are satisfied with it the way it is now. They're aware of how easy it is to bypass. It gives the illusion of privacy, which is all they were after I think.
Tbh I only enabled it to keep people from following me to unrelated subreddits to argue in comments about trees and being obnoxious to other subs' mods.
People just can't handle the truth (that deep planting MM.111 apple rootstock has been shown to be safe & effective in multiple university trials, even placing the graft union below the soil line, and cloned rootstocks do not have a taproot or root crown/flare the way seedlings do anyway). The truth upsets them, and then they need to follow me around to unrelated subreddits being angry about it instead of accepting that sometimes the Root Flare Planting Police is sometimes, in some situations, simply wrong.
I find it hilarious that I've never had the level of people being upset over any far more controversial subjects but apple tree rootstock planting depth really gets them riled up. Turning on the setting seems to be plenty to shut it down though.
If bots can get an account in good standing they can use it to post propaganda on subreddits where new accounts are limited/prevented from posting.
One account by itself won't make a huge difference but if they have 5000 accounts they can have a "conversation" that is highly upvoted (by themselves) and seen by lots of people who will also engage in it, and that can push discourse in whatever direction the person behind the bots wants.
Yup. In the politics subs last year, the trolls would build up their karma by making low-effort posts in sports game day threads. Because when the game is on, and you post "Our team is so cooked!", everyone upvotes! And then they'd come onto the politics subs and push a particular orange candidate and/or the Polymarket odds.
Astroturf, propaganda, and scams. And if the account looks legit and established, it's harder to argue it's not a real person. Several years ago, there was a big thing about people willing to buy reddit accounts for money. And the older and more active they were, the more they would pay for them. And then as time went on, people started figuring out what those sold accounts were being used for. Some people don't care, and then fatten accounts up to be sold anyways.
Reddit accounts post the ads we see on here. Some of the in-line ads look almost like legit posts. I suspect that having higher karma might fool some people into thinking they're real posts and not adbot posts, but I'm not entirely sure. Also, I read an AMA recently by someone who said they were paid by a company to be their social media person who goes online and tries to shittalk competitors and upsetll the company they worked for, without ever saying they worked for them. I guess something like that would also be easier if they could just buy an account that already had tons of history and positive karma.
Negligible. An account with enough karma to post in the bigger subs does have value to advertisers, but it's trivial to get your karma that high. You could sell an entire botnet on the dark net, but for some random account with a few popular posts on legaladvice you wouldn't get near enough money to compensate you for the effort of posting.
Karma farming is a thing, but people do it for parasocial validation or the satisfaction of watching the number go up, like Cookie Clicker. In the old days of vBulletin, before karma and upvotes were invented, people would make pointless posts on "word association" and "let's count to a billion" threads just to increase the postcount underneath their profile pic.
They are also used by "creators" who read them on tiktok and YouTube.
Same. I don't want to say it's fake, but I also don't understand this, and LAOP doesn't provide much clarification.
She says the nanny is claiming it's a mistake, but what was the mistake? Did LAOP tell her to donate things and she donated the wrong things? If it wasn't a mistake, what's the nanny's motivation? Why would she do this?
I just find it all a bit baffling.
Even more baffling is that apparently LAOP went to Goodwill, and they did find a few small items. So that apparently shoots down the theory that the nanny lied and sold them. One of the strangest stories I've seen on LA ever. Desperately waiting for an update. Even if the update turns out to be "yeah I made it all up."
I know, I saw that! The nanny, apparently, didn't steal them to sell them or for herself, so why would she do this?? What's her motivation?? It just doesn't make any sense to me.
Edit: My best guess at the moment is that LAOP told the nanny to donate things, and there was a miscommunication of some kind, which is why LAOP has skimped on the details of how/why this occurred: they want it to appear to be a straight up theft, and not acknowledge a grey area of them telling the nanny to do this.
The thing that’s maybe nothing but is itching my brain is she specifies the clothes by age range but doesn’t say how old the baby is. And there are actually two children mentioned?
I was mulling the same thing over. She said that she donated all of her daughter’s 12 and 18 month clothes, plus all of the pajamas and sleep sacks from both children. The sizing is an odd detail to mention unless it’s in some way significant. This story could make sense if the daughter is a toddler who normally wears a 2T with maybe some 18 months items still, and she usually dresses a younger child, still a baby, in pajamas all day and in a sleep sack at night. Especially if the baby is in size 12 months.
That would make this a fairly easy mistake for someone who isn’t very familiar with the household, if they are actively cleaning out the previous two sizes of too small toddler clothes plus a storage closet with blankets and such in it - which would likely include all of the extra sleep sacks, and which is also a very likely place to have stored embroidered receiving blankets. That combination would then make sense of the claim that she was left scrambling for anything at all to keep the baby warm.
She mentions both a daughter and a son, but doesn't mention ages - although references hand-me-downs from the son. So I think the daughter is the younger child, and maybe the 18-month clothes are the hand-me-downs from the son and the 12-month clothes are what the daughter actively wears?
It would maybe explain why the nanny got rid of the 18-month stuff; if it's too small for the son, and big for the daughter, (and looks like 'boy' stuff,) the nanny not have known to keep it.
Even if it was a miscommunication, how could the nanny be so much of an idiot to donate everything including obviously sentimental keepsakes? Either there was one hell of a language barrier, or this may be the dumbest nanny I have heard of in a long time.
I know. It still doesn't really explain it, it's just the only thing I can think of? Like if LAOP was having a bad day and said she wanted to get rid of everything and the nanny took her literally?
Or LAOP says it's not their usual nanny, so maybe she didn't know the family all that well, and thought there was more clothes/items somewhere else and that she wasn't getting rid of all of it? LAOP does say they had stuff in another room, so maybe the nanny thought there was more in that room than there is??
I have no idea lol it's all so weird.
Right now I'm turning over in my head "what if the 'nanny' is actually the OP's mom or MIL, and OP is obscuring that detail." I couldn't see a hired non-relative babysitter doing this, but I could see an overbearing relative doing it, for an assortment of reasons (wants to give the clothes to another baby in the family, wants to replace them with things she likes better, thinks OP is a hoarder in need of intervention, it could be lots of things). It would also go a long way toward why the cops dismissed it.
Oh, that's a good theory! It's baffling when it's a part time nanny, but a relative with an axe to grind?
I like this theory! OP also mentions that this was part time, two days a week, and that it was only "for a few weeks to cover [OP's] extra workload". I could totally see an overbearing relative being asked to pitch in a couple days a week for a few weeks, and then it results in this.
If nanny had a drug problem (or whatever) and wanted to make some extra cash, this wouldn't be the way to do it! And since OP recovered some items from Goodwill, it seems like the "nanny" was telling the truth about donating.
So either overbearing relative, or it's what other people suggested, that there was a miscommunication between OP and the nanny. That would also explain why the police aren't willing to do anything, if the nanny misunderstood what items to donate, but OP did instruct the nanny to donate clothes.
I wonder if the mom said something like “everything here” gesturing to one or two draws or a space in the closet but nanny interpreted it to mean the whole thing.
Following instructions to donate items, and making a mistake by donating the wrong items.
Right, if we assume that's what happened. If we're taking LAOP's story at face value - which is what I did originally in this comment - then the nanny's motivation doesn't make any sense.
According to LAOP, the nanny - unprompted - cleared out all of the stuff and donated it. Which is why I asked: what's the motivation?
I agree that the nanny being told to donate things and mistakenly donating things seems more likely to me, because LAOP's telling is just bizarre.
I read that comment! They found a few small items but nothing significant. Wth does that even mean LAOP? They found some of the their baby items but not all of them? Not the clothing items that are most significant to the family?
People are trying to get any information out of them that could make this situation make any sense and they're being so vague.
Also, unless these are designer baby clothes, I'm a little skeptical at the idea that someone would bother stealing an entire infant wardrobe to sell. Most baby clothes I see online are either free or being sold for a few quid in bulk. It seems like it would just be a lot of time and effort to individually sell baby outfits for pretty minimal profit.
Maybe I'm wrong! I'm open to being corrected on this. I just think if I was going to steal from my employer to resell something, baby clothes wouldn't be what I'd go for.
I could see someone stealing them for drug money or desperation money. I know I have seen a few street stands in the city with odd items. Things like way too many DVDs for one person to own, school kid clothes, nurse uniforms, and obviously used shoes in way too many sizes for one family. And the seller only accepts cash. Usually these are items that were stolen, and are now being sold for money.
I've even seen cases of people getting on local train lines, and then walking up and down the isles with 5 jackets over their shoulders, trying to sell them. And then if you look closely, you can still see the anti-theft ink bomb devices still attached. So obviously stolen. And these people only go with 5 clothing items at a time.
I did think drugs might the exception when I wrote that comment but wasn’t sure! Thanks for weighing in.
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I've never had or needed a part time temporary nanny so I'm coming at this from a position of complete ignorance but it seems like an odd thing to ask such a person to do.
I know, the whole thing is weird. Like, she specifically says that she considered hand-me-down items to be sentimental - how is a part-time nanny supposed to know that they're sentimental? Why would you trust someone who doesn't really know you to make that call?
I'm also wondering it the sentimental hand me downs were boxed up, which might have made the nanny thing they were boxed up so that they could be given away.
I don't mind being that person. In fact, it worries me how few people are that person.
Me neither. They're no way the police would say it's not criminal because she apologized. Courtrooms are full of people who apologized. It makes no sense, I suspect more karma farming.
That is a lot of extra work for no gain. I could only think of there being a clothing drive contest but just Goodwill makes no sense.
I think LAOP is leaving important information out. The nanny did go to goodwill, LAOP says they were able to get some of their items back from speaking to the management there. To me, they seem like they are overreacting to an actual mistake.
This story is completely nonsensical and OP is absolutely withholding details about what happened here.
I am certain OP told the nanny to donate some stuff and there was some misunderstanding along the way. It explains why stuff was actually at Goodwill, and why the police are saying "bro... this isn't really a problem we're going to deal with".
I like the theory someone else in this comment section proposed which is that "the nanny" may well be a family member (mother/MIL?). Feels like that puts together a few of the odd shaped pieces.
Well hello missing missing reasons, fancy coming across you here!
Who knew a get out of jail free card is this easy to get? Just say sorry to the bank and go to an ATM to try and replace some of the banknotes.
A lot of crimes rely on criminal intent to be actual crimes.
Also I doubt the police are interested in charging someone who was told to donate a bunch of stuff (the most likely scenario) for accidentlaly donating some of the wrong things.
This is really what I think happened. It's the only way the story makes sense.
I’d be camped outside that goodwill until I had everything back (or proof it was never there).
Good news, you wouldn't even have time to unroll your sleeping bag before someone came out and told you that everything that didn't go straight on the rack had gone off to a centralised sorting facility and they have no idea where it is now or any way to find out. Thank you, come again.
Yes a grandmother contacted one i worked at and tried to describe new with tags jeans she had donated- no idea how to begin finding them. Even a an old family quilt- no idea but it wasn't kept at store.
That sounds less like donating and more like she stole them for a kid she knows
I saw someone responding to OP saying the nanny took them to Goodwill by saying "so you think she's only a thief and not a liar?"
LAOP says in one comment that she did find some of the stuff at Goodwill, so it seems like at least some of it was donated. The whole thing makes no sense to me.
In that case it baffles me why the nanny would tell the truth! I just have so many questions
My best guess is that LAOP told her to donate things, and was either unclear (eg. told the nanny to box up and donate "everything" but didn't mean everything) and now can't admit fault, or the nanny just simply misunderstood and that's the "mistake" the nanny referred to.
Maybe a language barrier is involved? Or the nanny is very young or much older? It just doesn’t make sense. Why would you donate all the clothes so that the kid had literally nothing to wear?
That, or the LAOP is exaggerating and the nanny just donated all the too small stuff on top of all the keepsakes. It sounds like there’s two kids in the household, maybe they donated the clothes that were too small for the older kid that they were saving for the younger kid but didn’t fit yet?
Who knows. It feels like there’s a lot of details missing here.
Exactly like, there has to be more to the story because, as told, it doesn't make sense.
I think the fact it's not their usual nanny is maybe relevant? Like if LAOP just said something like, "clear out this closet and donate it all," thinking it was obvious that XYZ wasn't included, but since the nanny doesn't really know LAOP/the family she just did it, didn't know what was sentimental, and assumed LAOP had other clothes or whatever, and literally wanted it completely cleared out.
Maybe she donated what couldnt be given to whoever she took it for
LAOP claims that she went to Goodwill and was able to get a few things back. So apparently it wasn't stolen? Still absolutely bizarre.
LAOP says in the thread she was able to recoup some items from the local goodwill
I'm wondering if the nanny was told to donate baby clothes items, so Amelia Bedelia'd it and found all of the baby clothes in the house and donated them.
The fact that OP has been to the goodwill and has had some of the items returned from the back of their storage shows that the nanny didn't just sell the items like so many commenters on LA are assuming.
It does sound like a mistake, and a shitty one, but LAOP seems like they are overreacting by trying to get the nanny arrested.
Anyone else immediately assume the laop stiffed the babysitter? Doesn't fit the facts but explained the title and the vibe. I have no idea what happened, the donation story with no reason behind it makes no sense
It sounds like the nanny took "spring cleaning" a bit too literally, leaving behind more questions than answers.