A Manhattan nanny is suing for discrimination after she says she was hired, then promptly fired by a wealthy Tribeca couple after they realized she was African-American.
Giselle Maurice, 44, was expecting $350 a day for a six-month stint as a live-in caretaker for Lynsey Plasco-Flaxman, the wife of a Manhattan financier who’d hired her to look after her baby, The New York Post reported. That never happened, however, seeing as Maurice was booted on her first day at work in 2016.
The nanny is now taking Plasco-Flaxman and her husband to court over wages she says she was promised.
“[I want] to show them, look, you don’t do stuff like that,” Maurice told the newspaper, claiming the couple paid her for a day’s work and sent her home in an Uber.
“I know it’s discrimination,” she added.
In her lawsuit, Maurice says Plasco-Flaxman freaked out upon learning her new nanny was Black. Frustrated, she fired off a text reading, “NOOOOOOOOO ANOTHER BLACK PERSON,” a text she thought she’d sent to Joel Plasco, her husband. Only she didn’t send it to Plasco, but mistakenly sent it to Maurice, twice.
After realizing her gaffe, the mother of two quickly fired the seasoned caretaker, saying she felt “uncomfortable,” according to the lawsuit. The couple’s outgoing nanny was also Black American and did a less than perfect job with their kids, Plasco-Flaxman explained, adding that she and her husband were actually expecting a Filipino.
Plasco has defended his family’s decision, calling their actions “reasonable” and arguing they could no longer trust Maurice after offending her the way they did.
“[My wife] had sent her something that she didn’t mean to say. She’s not a racist,” said Plasco, co-chairman of the Dalmore Group investment bank. “We are not racist people … But would you put your children in the hands of someone you’ve been rude to, even if it was by mistake? Your newborn baby? Come on.”
Plasco, who moved the family from London, also argued they didn’t owe Maurice any compensation since she wasn’t under contract, calling her lawsuit “extortion.”
Maurice scoffed at the claims, saying even despite the mother’s racist text, she wouldn’t have acted any differently toward the baby.
“Why would I do something to a baby?” she said. “I was willing to work with her and prove her wrong, but it was her conscience, and she couldn’t work with me anymore.”
Maurice told the Post she tried to settle their dispute through mediation but filed the lawsuit after things went left.
Plasco is still riled up over the whole ordeal, however, suggesting he and his wife are the victims here.
“I’m not someone who has millions of dollars lying around to just pay off people that are coming after me for extortion,” the millionaire banker fumed. “And now you’re playing straight into her hands.”
Maurice is seeking approximately $63,000 in damages.