Nightmare Nanny Diane Stretton Getting Some Public Support

Recently, the strange tale of “nightmare nanny” Diane Stretton and her bizarre refusal to vacate her former employer’s home after an employment termination went viral… and few could understand how such a scenario could even come to pass, much less persist.

In case you missed it, Stretton was hired as a nanny for a family in California, with room and board her only compensation. After her employers say she stopped working to their expectations, she was asked to leave… and she refused.

Given the nature of landlord tenant disputes, the nightmare nanny case wasn’t cut and dried. While Stretton as being compensated in accommodation and food, her status was not specifically that of an employee, and as such, police called to the home to eject the older woman declared the matter civil, and outside their jurisdiction.

Initially, Stretton — who has a past so legally rich she appears on her state’s vexatious litigant list for having been overly litigious — was framed as the bad guy, an elderly grifter exploiting the naivete of a young couple who simply wanted an unpaid domestic servant.

Now, as the case continues on, the Bracamonte family has been similarly criticized. Over on Gawker, writer Tom Scocca makes a strong case for Stretton and the sins of the unwitting landlords with whom she currently locks horns — and he makes some reasonable points.

Scocca writes:

“The Bracamontes decided they needed a live-in servant to help care for their children, but they did not want to pay wages for that labor. Through some combination of greed, stupidity, and self-regard, they believed that in lieu of paying for the work, they could simply give the person they hired meals and a place in their house to sleep… Now, to their shock, the Bracamontes have discovered that the person who initially agreed to work on their exploitative and illegal terms is unreasonable.”

Adding that “this person they were ripping off—this marginal and allegedly disturbed person they thought should be caring for their children—won’t go away,” Scocca continues:

“Good for Stretton. How sadly fallen is this country when crooks like the Bracamontes can put themselves forth as sympathetic figures? Why, because they own a house? Because they ‘created’ a ‘job?’ The Nanny From Hell is an avatar of our collective future, the symbol of a nation that screws people remorselessly and pretends it’s business as usual.”

Indeed, the story does raise at least one good question — in a country where few benefits outside a minimum wage exist, and inside this inarguably exploitative scenario, how would a woman like Stretton even move? It isn’t like she was compensated financially for her work.

Stretton has claimed she herself terminated the employment agreement after three months without a day off, and told a radio station:

“I quit two days before they fired me. And I gave 30 days of notice, which we had agreed to. Second of all, on the refusal to work, there’s only two days, and this was after I’d been there for 90 straight days without a day off, that I didn’t work. And those two days I had the flu so bad I was considering calling an ambulance.”

Scocca goes one step further, painting Stretton as our future aggregate. He writes that we can expect to see far more situations with nightmare nanny types in our future, as we are slowly building a country full of people with essentially nowhere to go:

“There will be desperate and unyielding old people lurking in every closet of the house. And we will all deserve it.”

Nanny Diane Stretton was meant to leave the premises this weekend, but as of now remains in the home.

[Image: Diane Stretton]