“Yoselyn Ortega is charged with taking the lives of two innocent children who were incapable of defending themselves,” said Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance. “This crime shocked and horrified parents around the city, many of whom entrust their children to the care of others both by necessity and by choice. My heart goes out to the family of those beautiful young children, and I hope that, with time, this family will heal.”

Ortega pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder in the first degree and two counts of murder in the second degree. Her exact motive for the stabbing has yet to be determined. She is currently undergoing psychiatric examinations and will return to court on Jan. 16.

BRAZILIAN SCULPTURES ON BROADWAY
Sculptures by Brazilian artist Saint Clair Cemin are now on display on Broadway between West 57th and 157th Streets. The public art exhibit, organized by the Broadway Mall Association, features seven surreal pieces at various intersections along the avenue, such as “Portrait of the Word ‘Why’ ” on West 73rd Street and “Aphrodite” on West 117th Street. The exhibit continues through January and includes a dial-in audio tour in English (212.901.3310) and Spanish (212.901.3311).

FIRE DAMAGES APTS. IN MORNINGSIDE HEIGHTS
An early-morning blaze in a Morningside Heights building displaced tenants of five apartments on Thursday, Nov. 29. The fire broke out around 5:30 a.m. on the fifth floor of 200 W. 109th St., a 40-unit apartment building, when a machine that pushes steam out windows ignited in a young tenant’s bathroom. The flames spread and severely damaged five apartments, as well as caused water damage to more apartments below. No tenants were injured.

CASTING CALL FOR BAKERS; SOUTINE BAKERY CLOSES
An upcoming competitive baking show on CBS is seeking skilled amateur bakers, and its casting producers are holding an “open call” audition on Saturday, Dec. 15, on the Upper West Side. All non-professional bakers are welcome, so aspiring television stars should bring their best baked good to Flatotel at 135 W. 52nd St. between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. “Whether you’re an athlete, teacher, truck driver or retiree,” the casting call’s promotional flyer says, “as long as you have a zest for baking, we want to hear from you!” More details can be found at cbsbakingshow.com.

In other UWS baking news, Soutine Bakery, the tiny shop at 104 W. 70th St., just closed on Friday after 30 years of business. The shop faced a rent increase, so it sold its lease to Muffins Cafe, according to the West Side Rag. Perhaps local amateur bakers can look here for work if they don’t make the cut for CBS?

Local residents pass by the memorial set up outside the Krim's apartment building

As police continue to try and discover the motive behind nanny Yoselyn Ortega’s recent stabbing of two Upper West Side children, the victimized family’s neighborhood faces the challenge of coming to terms with a tragedy that is the realization of every parent’s nightmare.

Marina Krim found Leo, her 2-year-old son, and Lucia, her 6-year-old daughter, bleeding in their bathroom’s tub on Thursday, Oct. 25. She came home with her third child after Ortega failed to meet her with Leo and Lucia at the dance studio where Lucia had a scheduled lesson. According to police, the family’s apartment at 57 W. 75th St. was dark when Marina arrived, so she asked the building’s doorman if Ortega and the kids had left, then returned to her home to check again. Ortega waited in the bathroom with the unconscious children, and plunged a kitchen knife into her own throat when Marina entered the room.

Multiple neighbors reported hearing Marina’s screams. The doorman dialed 911, and medics rushed Ortega and the stabbed children to the hospital, where Leo and Lucia were pronounced dead. Marina’s husband, CNBC executive Kevin Krim, was told of the events when he landed at John F. Kennedy Airport that evening.

Ortega fell into a coma over the weekend, but recovered shortly thereafter. Police finally were able to question her last Saturday, and a police official told the New York Times that she said she resented the family because they were always telling her what to do. She did not confess to the stabbing, but told detectives, “Marina knows what happened,” the Times reported. After the interview, police charged her with first-degree murder.

The question on the minds of most passersby in front of the Krims’ apartment on Friday, Oct. 26, was “why?”: How could a 50-year-old nanny caring for a family that was by neighbors’ accounts happy and healthy, that reportedly loved Ortega, and even spent time visiting her own family at her former home in the Dominican Republic—how could someone so immersed in their life commit such a violent act?

The question was far from disinterested speculation for many Upper West Side families. A large number of parents throughout the neighborhood employ nannies, who are sometimes hired through an agency and submitted to background checks, but just as often paid under the table and recommended by word of mouth alone. (Ortega was referred to the Krims a few years ago by her sister, Celia Ortega, 53, who told the Daily News on Friday that she would “like to die” if it would make the children come back.)

Locals were forced to look at their own beloved caretakers in a way most never had: How could they make certain that such a thing never happened to their own children?

“After this, parents should never leave their children with anybody—not alone,” said Juana Vasquez, an Upper West Side mother of four. “Take the children to a public place, like daycare. But don’t leave them in the house. Even after a background check, you can never totally trust anybody.”

A neighbor across the street from the Krims was more sympathetic to nannies’ importance in the community. “People need nannies,” she said, and contended that the murder would not significantly hurt the job prospects of local domestic workers. Still, she added, the incident would affect how they are hired: “I think people are going to open their eyes and say we’ve got to check them out. They are going to realize that if you don’t have a background check and you don’t ask questions, then you are risking your family and your life.”

A Midwesterner named Bill, whose daughter in the area employs a nanny, took a philosophical perspective on the issue. Any time you leave your kids in the care of someone else, “There’s a possibility of a tragedy like this,” he reflected. “Here in the city, the unknown is everywhere. You can’t be afraid of life because bad things can happen. I’m not sure if that’s a healthy way to live.”

Bill noted that while his daughter was shaken by the tragedy, she is very comfortable with her nanny and has no intention of letting her go.

Many locals stopped by 57 W. 75th St. with flowers or cards during the afternoon on the day after the murder, Oct. 26, to add to an already-abundant memorial of these items piled up against the building’s stone pillars. Some people came with friends, some stopped and stared at the memorial in silence. “We weep with you at your horrible loss,” said a note from Sharon and Rob Taylor, residents of a nearby building. “There are no words that can express our sadness. We pray for you and your beautiful children.”

With wiggling toddlers in strollers, nannies came to the memorial, too. They shared condolences for the family, and attempted to make sense out of the tragedy along with the rest of the community.

“I can feel the difference when I’m walking,” said one of a group of four local nannies, all of whom agreed that the Upper West Side’s domestic workers maintain a strong social network, though none knew Ortega personally (or wanted to give their names to the press). “Normally no one acknowledges you. Now everybody’s looking in your eye.”

“Now it’s like they look really hard to see if they could remember a face when something happens,” agreed a second woman.

The four said they felt secure in their jobs and would not act differently around their employers, but they thought that many nannies in the area will now have a difficult time finding jobs.

“Families are going to be scared of hiring new nannies,” said the second woman.

“They’re going to be put through a fine-toothed comb,” said the first.

“And I don’t blame them,” added the third. “This is your most precious thing,” she said, pointing to the sleeping child in the stroller in front of her. “This is what you live for.”

But when is surveillance too much? The women weighed the importance of security against Ortega’s still-largely-inexplicable attack, which even an intimate relationship with the Krim children failed to stop.

“I don’t feel comfortable with cameras,” said the first woman. “That’s too much. I did not come to do this job because I want to pay my rent. If a person doesn’t love kids, go and clean the park.”

“Are parents going to put cameras in their children’s school?” agreed the second. “They have to let go of the child at some point.”

She added that she suspected Ortega had some sort of mental disorder. “Ninety-nine point nine percent of nannies don’t have health insurance, so if there’s something wrong with them, they’re not going to go to a doctor to get it treated.”

“Well, something snapped,” the fourth woman said. “No one who is healthy in her mind does that. If somebody [else] did not walk in there and do this, then something snapped in her.”

“Snapped,” in fact, is the same word Celia Ortega used to rationalize her sister’s behavior to the New York Post. “We don’t understand what happened to her mind,” she said.

What drove an unhappy person to commit a crime that very few unhappy people do, however, remains a question that Upper West Side families, nannies included, still want more-fully answered. A clear motive, no matter how twisted, at least provides an explanation. Without one, locals are left with only Juana Vasquez’s uncomfortable maxim: “You can never totally trust anybody.”

For most of her seven-year career as a nanny, Anna has been fortunate to work for two families that have paid her a decent wage for roughly nine hours of work a day. Her duties usually include taking the children for a stroll or to play dates, cooking dinner in the evening and cleaning.

But even with good employers, Anna has still been denied something as basic as proper time off. The first family that hired her, she said, never provided paid sick days. Luckily for her, they weren’t needed. In fact, she was unaware that such perks were common until she interviewed for a position with a woman—a lawyer—who promised one a month.

“There’s no right to complain,” the West African nanny said.

Mary, a 60-year-old nanny who is also from West Africa, was recently let go because of the tough economy. She received no severance from the family other than a one-day-per-week cleaning gig, though she hopes the family will help her find another nanny position. She claims European families are more inclined to give severance pay. A French family in Manhattan that hired her in the late 1990s paid out $2,000 when they had to let her go.

Earlier this year, a rally on the steps of the Capitol in Albany pushed for legislation in both the State Senate and Assembly that would protect the rights of domestic workers.

While these women talk lovingly of the families that hired them, they also hear the stories other nannies tell each other in the playground coffee klatch.

“You go to a play date or park, they talk about their boss,” says Mary, a domestic worker since 1995. “I never have the problems, but some complain.”

The complaints include simple annoyances, like being barred from eating inside the boss’ home, or having to take the children outdoors every day. But other grievances are more serious: the family goes on vacation and refuses to pay the nanny for time away, or the nannies are denied paid sick days. For people on a tight budget, this lost work adds up and can force them to look for consistent employment elsewhere.

“They can’t pay rent, can’t pay for food,” Anna said. “They’ll go find another job.”

Domestic workers are guaranteed the federal minimum wage, but there are no guidelines for working conditions and rights, and few avenues to complain. Given that most of the metropolitan area’s 200,000 domestic workers are undocumented immigrants, and with job opportunities becoming scarcer, few are willing to voice an objection.

“They have to change the law,” Mary said.

Now, a coalition of domestic workers, labor unions and human rights organizations is waiting for the State Legislature to return to Albany this fall, hoping to do just that.

Patricia, a Caribbean immigrant who has been a nanny for just more than a decade, sees great value in her job. If she is late, so is her boss.

“We make other work possible,” she says proudly.

She is currently unemployed and has worked for families in New Jersey and the West Side. Throughout her career, she has seen the vulnerability of domestic workers and even the abuse that can be inflicted—intentionally or negligently—by the families that rely on their service.

Patricia says she has been a victim of physical and verbal abuse, and was denied overtime pay and much-needed time off. And because every major labor law fails to cover domestic workers or splits hairs between those who live inside and outside the family’s home, it is near impossible to recoup money.

She became involved with Domestic Workers United, a group started in 2000 that has been lobbying Albany for a bill to provide basic labor rights to these employees.

Since the bill’s first introduction in 2004, the legislation got little traction. But last year’s Democratic takeover of the State Senate brightened prospects when Staten Island State Sen. Diane Savino, a former labor leader, became the main sponsor. However, the coup this past June and month-long stalemate that ensued have shelved progress until the next session this September, at the earliest.

Depending on which bill makes it to the governor’s desk (see box)—the meatier Senate version, the basic legislation proposed by the Assembly or a combination of the two—the law aims to drastically change working conditions for a majority of nannies in the city and surrounding suburbs. The state’s labor department and the attorney general would have enforcement power over these new laws, and could prosecute employers who stiff their nanny. Most nannies are undocumented workers and thus most vulnerable to mistreatment because they are reluctant to report abuse and risk exposing their immigration status.

Workers march on the Upper East Side on April 25.

The bill legally defines a domestic worker as a person of legal age who cares for a child or elderly person in someone’s home, so as to not inadvertently cover babysitters and minors. Rights outlined in the legislation will likely include a guarantee of at least one day off a week, sick days, a yearly weeklong vacation, paid holidays and time and a half for overtime.

“We’re not asking for more than any other worker,” Patricia said.

Actually, they are not asking for anything more than the rights already given to the small percentage of legally documented nannies who are placed through agencies (a Domestic Workers Union study found that only 16 percent of those surveyed were placed through an agency).

The New York Nanny Center, Inc., for example, screens both the families and the nannies and draws up an agreement between the two before the match is made. This agreement spells out the number of days the nanny will work with a maximum of five days a week, responsibilities, two weeks paid vacation and major holidays, plus any other conditions the nanny and family want to make.

“I think that in most licensed agencies, there is an expectation that there is a fair job description for the nanny,” said Carol Solomon, director of the New York Nanny Center, Inc. “Agencies are trying to establish what’s fair for everybody so nobody is taken advantage of in these situations.”

The change would be a significant one for non-agency nannies. Domestic Workers United released a survey that showed that the majority of nannies interviewed don’t get overtime pay, health insurance or contracts that outline their responsibilities. The survey is one of the few glimpses legislators in Albany have into this profession, because the government provides so few statistics.

“The workforce isn’t registered anywhere,” said Ai-Jen Poo, lead organizer for Domestic Workers United. “All this invisible labor…is not accounted for and makes it difficult for us to advocate for protection because it’s not even seen.”

In an April rally at the Capitol, author Barbara Ehrenreich, who documented her own undercover work in unskilled professions, held a press conference to promote the cause. Former nannies gave testimonials about their mistreatment, and some even showed legislators photographs of physical abuse victims.

“We had to educate them on exploitation and present cases to them,” said Joycelyn Gill-Campbell, a former nanny and full-time organizer with Domestic Workers United. “Give them first-hand information.”

Passing a law is only the beginning, though, as enforcing regulations that govern workers inside the home could prove problematic as well. The bills currently under consideration would have the state labor commissioner report on the feasibility of implementing paid vacation and sick days, severance pay, collective bargaining and other provisions for domestic workers. A state task force would also be created to study how to reach out to employers and nannies.

Domestic Workers United, the lead group lobbying for the law, also plans to launch an education campaign with help from the state’s justice department.

“We have to do creative outreach. We have to work with churches and synagogues,” Poo said. “The industry is very decentralized.”

Perhaps it is unfathomable for famously liberal Manhattanites to deny supporting paid time off and overtime for their nannies. There are many that do so already. While the new law would hit families in the wallet at a time when they may be evaluating if they can afford such help at all, the benefit would be clear rules on paying and treating nannies, decreasing reliance on parent blogs, forums and neighbors for second-hand, unverifiable advice. Online communities are rife with questions about paying a nanny on the books, when to give raises and compensating nannies who accompany the family on a vacation.

“There are people—Mr. and Mrs. Smith who hire a housekeeper and nanny—who feel the work they do is so vital to their family and that they deserve basic protection under the law,” Poo said. “People won’t have to go to friends or chat rooms to find out what is fair.”

*Pseudonyms were used in this article to protect the identity of nannies who are employed or looking for work.

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The Bills at a Glance

State Senate Bill
• At least one day off a week; the employee can choose to work that day, but at an overtime rate
• Six paid holidays
• Seven sick days
• Five vacation days
• Employer must give a two-week notice of termination
• Imposes civil fines or imprisonment
• Allows domestic workers to sue for underpayment or lost wages; the attorney general or Department of Labor can bring a lawsuit on behalf of a domestic worker

Assembly Bill
• Overtime pay after eight hours of work per day
• At least one day off a week
• Grants disability insurance to part-time domestic workers
• Collective bargaining rights
• Gives the Department of Labor and domestic workers wage and hour enforcement powers
• Directs the Department of Labor to form a task force to educate domestic workers and employers on new law