Kelly Andrade Staten Island au pair wins $2.78M after chicken mogul boss Michael Esposito secretly filmed her ongoing, abusing his position of employer, despite previously claiming he had every right to have a ‘security cameras’ in his own home.
A live-in nanny has been awarded $2.78 million after filing a lawsuit against her Staten Island employer for ongoing filming her with cameras hidden in her bedroom.
Michael Esposito, 35, a fast food chicken mogul and owner of three LaRosa Grill franchises, was caught secretly filming 28-year-old Kelly Andrade in the nude .
A Manhattan jury heard how the fast food entrepreneur secretly installed a camera in his young Colombian au pair‘s bedroom smoke detector, capturing ‘hundreds’ of explicit videos of the unsuspecting nanny.
‘Irreversible damage’
Esposito was arrested in 2021 on a charge of unlawful surveillance, a felony punishable by up to four years in prison. But the Staten Island District Attorney and a Staten Island judge instead offered Esposito a plea deal, in which he was spared jail time on the proviso he undergo counseling and satisfy two years probation.
‘It’s not enough for the whole situation I’ve been through these three years. It’s not enough,’ Andrade told the nypost. ‘I was angry because the damage that he caused me is irreversible.’
Matters first came to the fore in 2021.
Before coming to work for her Staten Island boss, a then 25 year old Andrade underwent hundreds of hours of training with placement firm, Cultural Care Au Pair inviting the Colombian emigre to relocate to the U.S where she came to work for Esposito and his wife, Danielle. The Espositos were staying in Danielle’s parents waterfront Tottenville home while their nearby $2.3 million mansion was being renovated.
The Espositos gave Andrade a bedroom to sleep in while she cared for their four young children, but the au pair claimed she kept catching Esposito in her room, fiddling with the ceiling smoke detector, which ‘was constantly being repositioned,’ according to the lawsuit.
‘Hundreds of risque recordings’
Less than three weeks into the job, she examined the smoke detector, finding a camera inside with a memory card filled with ‘hundreds of recordings,’ many capturing her ‘nude and/or dressing/undressing,’ she charged in the lawsuit.
‘Within minutes’ of her finding the device, Esposito showed up at the house.
‘He seemed very nervous and he seemed very worried when he arrived to the house,’ Andrade recalled.
Andrade tried to pretend she was sleeping in a bid to get Esposito to leave, but he was ‘banging on the door’, with the traumatized woman leaping from a first-floor window in a bid to get away, injuring her knee in the process.
In her possession was the camera and memory card full of risque images of her that Esposito had taken without her permission.
The first night after leaving the Espositos, Andrade who barely spoke English and not knowing anyone in the U.S, ‘slept on the street in a bush,’ her attorney, Zachary Holzberg stated in the filed lawsuit.
Andrade reported the incident to cops at the 123rd Precinct, who arrested Esposito March 24, 2021.
‘I felt, abused, humiliated. I didn’t know what he was using the images for?!’
But in April 2022 the Staten Island businessman ‘entered into a two-step plea.’ After ‘successfully completing’ a year of counseling, Esposito ‘was permitted’ to withdraw his felony plea and pled down to attempted unlawful surveillance, a misdemeanor, with only two years probation, the Staten Island DA’s office said.
Esposito’s attorney at the time, Joseph Sorrentino told the Staten Island Advance, ‘We disagree with and deny the allegations that have been put forth.’
Adding, ‘Any cameras that were installed were installed in his own home for security purposes. This was not the kind of situation where it’s her home or her room or her bedroom or in a dressing room. This is the defendant’s own home where he lives with his family and there are multiple security cameras.’
Speaking to NBCNY, Andrade said she ‘felt, abused, humiliated.’ Adding, ‘she did not know for what he used it for. Along with who else has seen the video and images.’
Andrade and Holzberg had sought to get a criminal conviction against Esposito.
At the four-day civil trial this month in Brooklyn Federal Court, Andrade testified for three days. Esposito never took the stand.
The au pair said she was ‘in shock’ just to be in the same room as Esposito.
Holzberg said he argued that ‘there was no consequence’ for Esposito, ‘who got probation . . . a slap on the wrist.’
The attorney added: ‘Despite him doing this, he got to go home to is wife and children in their mansion and she’s sleeping on the street.’
The jury awarded $780,000 in emotional distress damages against both Michael and his wife Danielle Esposito, as well as $2 million in punitive damages against the father.
‘Right now I’m working on myself recovering,’ Andrade said. ‘It wasn’t easy for me to be on a trial. It was a very difficult time for me. It brings back memories that I’m trying to forget.’
Andrade, who lives in New Jersey with her husband of two years, said she is speaking out ‘to encourage many au pairs and also immigrants who have been victims of abuse. Don’t keep quiet. Don’t be afraid to report your aggressor.’
Andrade settled her lawsuit with Cultural Care Au Pair last month for an undisclosed sum, court papers show.
