Argh! Good friend's valuable stuff donated to charity! WTFDID?

[PrincessTeacake]

Long story short, friend is an au pair I befriended through playdates. She left on bad terms with her host mother, left some things in their house fully intending to come back for them. I was at the house today and offered to pick up the stuff, found out host mother had given them to a charity shop. I thought it was pretty bad form but I thought it was just easily replaceable clothes and left it at that.

Turns out there were several books in there with great monetary and sentimental value. Friend is distraught, host mother is not answering her calls or my texts, I have no idea how to track these things down beyond ringing every charity shop in the county, and I'm waiting on my friend to message me with a detailed description.

Any ideas?

better if Op paid

should heave read au pair there - bizarre auto correct

i have to agree, i think it's quite strange.

the book was so incredibly valuable to her, and yet she didn't manage to make it a priority to take with her when she left?

she now is just lying around and drinking tea?

i mean, come on OP! I can tell you are good friends with her, and obv feel for her very much, but she can't expect you to sort this!

Why is the host mother being so vague about where the books etc are? It's possible she went through the things as she bagged them up, & noticed the books were valuable? Perhaps she still has them?
Maybe txt the host mother once more to see if her memory has improved, then get your friend to contact the police & let them take it from there, there isnt anything else you can do.

YABU to play go between in this way just because you are on good terms with the ex-employer. You aren't doing your Au Pair friend any favours by letting the woman get away with more stonewalling and hestitation. She could clearly be more helpful but isn't being - she doesn't seem to realize that what she has done is criminal. Your Au Pair friend needs to stop playing the drama queen, lying around all distraught, and get practical. She should go to the police today, before her ex-employer has a chance to muddy the waters further.

She's playing games

I think both the au pair and OP friend are playing games.

It's reasonable to offer tea and sympathy.
It's reasonable, for example, to drive the au pair to an out of the way shop or depot to retrieve her possessions.

However, the au pair is an adult. She needs to act on her own behalf.
The employer sounds like a total cow tbh, but you needn't be the go between.

the police may have better success tracing the items than you or her - i would report it in the hope she might get her things back.

im in the police - i had a theft reported recently similar to this - i traced the goods - they were a 2 hour drive away but the complainant got some of her things back.

she needs to speak with the host mother and if she is not more forthcoming with the information she could call police.

Are you an au pair too? Are your employers and the other mother friends? I'd so butt out your could be putting yourself in a dodgy position as your friend has an attack of the vapours.

No, I'm a nanny, and not live-in, and I have a great relationship with my employer and my mindees so the position I'm in is a lot more secure than my friend's was. Host mother has had me come over twice for emergency childcare when there was a gap between au pairs, and I've never really had a problem with her, but those were over very short periods of time. I'm getting to know the new au pair now and she's having problems with the host mother now too.

The main reason I'm going to such lengths is because we only found out about this last night, when it was too late to do anything about. Friend is feeling better now (I suggested she just take the evening to calm down and apply the standard Irish cure for shock, strong tea) but she has a full day of classes, whereas I have the day free until 6pm when I have to get halfway across the country.

Contact the host mother and say:-

"Au pair has got classes until 6pm after which I think she is planning to go to the police. If you get the stuff back to me by then then she won't."

The host mother should be doing the running around - not you.

If you're working as an au pair, how much valuable stuff do you bring with you to a job/host family, and how much of that would you leave behind if you were parting on bad terms? A month is a long time to leave things in someone's house, especially if you've not made it clear when you'll be calling back to collect it.

Yes, it's unfortunate for your friend, and I'm sure she'll learn a lesson from this.

Some charity shops are very savvy these days and employ salaried managers who will sift through donations price compare on eBay or even list on eBay or send to local auction. And of course they're allowed to take first dibs. Your stuff may be traceable via some of those above, but if someone walked in off the street there's no purchase record for them. Perhaps you could try a story in the local press in that instance.

I think it would be hard to make this out of theft as part of the mens rea is dishonesty and I can't see that the ex employer has beyond reasonable doubt been dishonest as disposing of stuff that's been left behind by someone who has left the country is pretty normal and not is honest behaviour.

Mystery.

Knowingly perminantly depriving someone of there possessions is dishonest.

The act of theft does not have to have personal gain to be classed as dishonest.

mystery - i would take issue with that - the OP friends kept in touch and said she had every intention of going to pick her things up. It would seem to me that the host mother has done this out of spite - im a cop and i would happily investigate this were it reported to me.

It is a conversion, but it's a criminal one because the host mother knew she was depriving the au pair of goods which were rightfully hers.

If, for some bizarre reason, she could claim she didn't know she was depriving the au pair of her own goods, it would still be conversion, but in common law rather than criminal law.

You can't just dispose of other people's stuff, fro gods sake. Shocked that some posters think you can!

Has she records of keeping in touch? Had her contract ended (in that it would be usual to assume she wouldn't be returning)?

You cannot go threatening this woman with the police - you will ruin your relationship with the host, and that can have repercussions far down the line.

All you can do is advise your friend on a course of action, which may or may not involve threatening to call the police.

Presumably the host needed the room back for her new au pair, and didn't want your friend's discarded belongings cluttering the place up. I don't see how she could have seen it any other way unless she was aware that the books were valuable.

You need to find a sympathetic policeman.

Would that vile woman have illegally disposed of the personal items of someone she thought wasn't a) young, b) vulnerable and c) foreign and ignorant of and hesitant to exercise her rights? Would she fuck.