A disturbing surveillance video obtained by The Post shows a city-funded babysitter repeatedly walloping three young children with a belt and donning a creepy Santa Claus costume to scare them — and the horrified family is now demanding answers.
La’keysha Jackson, 24, started working for Bronx mother Geraldine Jaramillo a year ago through a contractor paid for by the city’s Administration for Children’s Services, which provides babysitters to struggling families.
The single mother said she discovered the violent treatment last month when the children’s Pennsylvania-based grandmother checked a home surveillance camera in the bedroom and was horrified to learn that the babysitter was beating the boys, who were ages 2, 4, and 6.
However, despite the family reporting the horrifying behavior to ACS and the NYPD, as well as filing a complaint against Jackson on felony charges, she has yet to be arrested, according to the family.
“We called the police, filed a report, and went to the hospital,” Jaramillo told The Post after the shocking May 6 incident.
“They promised to arrest her and it’s been three — almost four — weeks and nothing has happened yet.”
The video shows the brutal babysitter beating two crying children nearly 60 times, according to Jaramillo’s attorney’s notice of claim filed on Monday, indicating her intent to sue.
In the video, the callous caregiver can be seen whipping the underwear-clad children’s behinds and restraining their tiny arms as they try in vain to deflect the blows.
“Guess what’s about to happen?” She can be heard saying something, clearly upset that the two older children, aged four and six, did not clean up their rooms.
“Belt?” one of the young boys asks as Jackson, wearing a T-shirt with the words “Heaven Sent,” pulls a thick brown belt from a cross-body bag.
“You’re right—I warned y’all,” she says cheerfully, adding chillingly, “Drop ’em.”
The babysitter also bizarrely wore a grotesque Halloween mask from the gory slasher film “Terrifier II” and a Santa Claus outfit, which Jaramillo discovered in her home, to apparently frighten the children, according to video footage.
Jackson was hired by Selfhelp, a home aid provider contracted by the troubled ACS, through its homemaking program, which provides a babysitter to assist struggling city families with caretaking, according to Jaramillo and documentation shared with The Post.
But what was supposed to be miraculous assistance turned into a living nightmare for the mother, who was initially connected with the homemaking service while fleeing a domestic violence situation, she said.
Until her own mother discovered the video, Jaramillo and her parents treated Jackson as a member of the family, celebrating holidays together and occasionally allowing her to sleep in a spare bedroom to avoid the long journey back to Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn from the Bronx.
However, the family later discovered that “she was beating the kids every other day,” according to the kids’ grandfather, Rudy Enamorado, who drove two hours from his Pennsylvania home after seeing the footage.
“Hitting the kids with the [clothes] hangers, hitting them with belts, throwing the baby,” Jaramillo said, adding that the babysitter also abused the children emotionally and verbally.
Jackson was the family’s second sitter after the first, from the same ACS-contracted agency, was caught drinking and smoking at a playground while watching the kids, according to Jaramillo.
“The worst thing we did was let our guard down,” explained Enamorado.
His wife, the children’s grandmother, only checked the nannycam on May 6 because Jaramillo started a new job and asked her to ensure the babysitter put the boys to bed on time, she said.
After the family reported what they saw and took the kids to the hospital for treatment in the aftermath of the beating, Enamorado recalled how there were “maybe like 10-12 police and detectives in the house” — and how a “seasoned detective” wept after seeing the video.
“That made us assured that she was going to get arrested that same night,” he recalled. “But to this day, nothing has been taken care of.”
Jackson did not respond to requests for comment, but her last text message to Jaramillo, which was shared with The Post, expressed her “love” for the boys.
“It’s a learning experience for us all,” the message stated, which Jaramillo described as “infuriating.”
“I am their number one supporter when it comes to their safety and well being,” the report stated.
Jackson’s brother told a Post reporter outside their Bed-Stuy home on Monday that what the video showed was normal in black families.
“Abuse my ass,” he was saying. “That happens in black families all the time.”
It’s unclear how much Jackson was paid, but Selfhelp has a $1.23 million contract with ACS for homemaking services, according to records.
According to a recent exposé by The Post, seven children have died while in ACS care since the beginning of last year, with many more suffering from abuse.
Despite the troubling data, oversight of the agency is lacking, according to Jocelyn Strauber, the city’s Department of Investigation commissioner, in a Saturday opinion essay for The Post calling for a change in current onerous oversight rules that are unique to ACS.
Jaramillo claimed that after the May 6 incident, ACS conducted a home visit and apologized after viewing the video, but then launched an investigation into her — rather than Jackson — claiming she lacked documentation from the children’s hospital visit that day.
“I’m also under investigation,” she said, noting that ACS workers have been making home visits every other week since. “They say it’s protocol.”
An ACS spokesperson did not respond to that claim, but did state that Jackson no longer works for Selfhelp and that the ACS was cooperating with the NYPD in its investigation.
“We are taking these despicable actions very seriously, and we have commenced a review of the contracted provider’s procedures,” according to the representative.
A Selfhelp spokesperson confirmed Jackson’s termination and stated that the company is fully cooperating with the NYPD, claiming that all employees undergo drug testing and background checks.
According to police sources, officers attempted to arrest Jackson Monday morning on assault and child endangerment charges but were unsuccessful.
“I don’t want the service no more,” Jaramillo said of the ACS homemaking program. “I had two very bad experiences with that agency and with the homemakers.”
Her children are now afraid to remove their clothes, leave their room, or even use the restroom, according to their mother.
“They say the bathroom is scary,” Jaramillo told The Post. “We don’t understand why.”
The boys are also becoming increasingly aggressive toward one another, fighting, hitting, and even suffocating the baby, according to the mother.
“They’re so traumatized,” Jaramillo said. “I don’t know where they’re learning these things, I don’t know if they’re repeating stuff that was happening to them.”
The grandfather, Enamorado, stated, “They were never like this before…” They have rage.”
Daniel Szalkiewicz, the family’s lawyer, said he hopes the story serves as a “wake-up call for parents.”
“No matter who recommended your childcare provider – a friend, family, or even if it’s the agency that holds itself as the paragon of good childcare — don’t let your guard down,” she warned.
“Even if there are cameras, even if they’re supposed to be trained, even if you believe them completely. “It could happen to anyone.”
Jaramillo, a caseworker for senior citizens, said no one suspected the babysitter of beating the children because everyone, including the kids’ school, “loved her.”
“When I found some bruising, she would always tell me ‘oh, they were fighting, or they were playing, or they fell at school,'” remembered the mother.
Jaramillo, whose aunt is now assisting with childcare, said she wants justice for her children and to determine what happened in her home.
“I really want to get to the bottom of this,” she told me. “Just seeing them, it’s as if they’re completely different kids. They’re going through a lot. They may not say it, but they are.
