News
Narjas Zatat
Oct 01, 2018
Liderina / iStock Getty
An African American nanny is suing a couple after the mother sent her a racist text before firing her.
Lynsey Plasco-Flaxman, from Manhattan, had been interviewing for a nanny to look after her new-born baby.
However, when she realised the woman who had come for the interview – 44-year-old Giselle Maurice – she intended to send the following message to her husband, Joel Plasco:
NOOOOOOOOOOO ANOTHER BLACK PERSON.
In a karmic twist, she ended up accidently sending the racist message to Maurice. Not once, but twice.
When she realised her mistake, she fired Maurice on the grounds that she felt ‘uncomfortable.’
Maurice is suing the couple for discrimination, and is seeking compensation after alleging they told her she was getting $350-a-day for the six-month live-in job.
Maurice expressed her disappointment with the situation to New York Post. She said:
[I want] to show them, look, you don’t do stuff like that.
‘I know it’s discrimination,’ she adds.
The family has defended their actions. Plasco, who is a co-chairman of Dalmore Group Investment Bank said:
[My wife] had sent her something that she didn’t mean to say. She’s not a racist. We’re not racist people.
But would you put your children in the hands of someone you’ve been rude to, even if it was a mistake? Your new-born baby? Come on.
Maurice said she would never hurt a child.
‘This is my reputation,’ she countered. ‘Why would I do something to a baby?’
I was willing to work with her and prove her wrong, but it was her conscience, and she couldn’t work with me anymore.
She insists that she tried to settle the issue through mediation. It hadn’t worked, forcing her into filing a lawsuit.
Plasco is accusing Maurice of extortion.
I’m not someone who has millions of dollars lying around to just pay off people that are coming after me for extortion.
And now you’re playing straight into her hands.
My wife was two months off having a baby, suffering from a very difficult situation.
You’re going to go after someone like that? That’s not a very nice thing to do.
More: Author tweets that Christianity and racism 'cannot coexist', so the internet had some thoughts
More: YouTube make-up and beauty stars apologise for 'racist comments'
Top 100
The Conversation (0)