Cell phone theft in the preschool

Recently, security was tightened all the more in my children’s school because of theft. Apparently, a woman pretending to be a close friend of one of the studens’ parents came to the school and spoke to a student’s yaya. She even greeted the school administrator and seemed at home in the school. At one point, the impostor borrowed the yaya’s cell phone, saying she wanted to call the child’s parents. The yaya entrusted her cell phone and the woman simply disappeared. That was the last time the yaya saw her cell phone. In the school’s 20- plus-year history, it was the first time an incident like this had happened. I’m making way for a letter my preschool owner friend, Tina Zamora, has written because it seems that there is now a modus operandi targeting preschools. Parents, teachers and, yes, yayas, beware! 

Dear Maricel,

On August 2, at around 10:45 am., a woman posing as an inquiring parent stole from our school. She’s in her early 30s, short, morena, chubby with short dark hair. But the thing you’ll notice is that she talks way too much about everything. Probably this is how she masks her thievery.

She came in complaining that she wasn’t happy with the current preschool of her three-year-old son and one-year-old daughter. In hindsight (which is always the case in crimes ... grrrr), we remember that she rarely looked at us while we were explaining our philo, classes, etc. She was looking around – tables, ceiling, things, etc. She asked us to show her the classrooms which we did. 

All the teachers had their "kutob" with this woman but, of course, our accommodating preschool-teacher attitude got the better of us. She left saying that her kids were already outside and they’d just eat at McDonald’s before enrolling. She never came back.

Here are some details that she shared about herself (although they may not be true):

1) She lives in Xavierville and their family just arrived from the States.

2) She’s with the Miriam High School batch ’91 and her maiden name is De Castro.

3) She studied at UST for college.

4) She’s opening a boutique in Tiendesitas.

5) Her kids are David and Francesca.

6) She was referred by Glenda Ricafort. 

She took brochures from our school and took down teachers’ names. Obviously, she will cite our school if she plans to hit another school.

I’ve spoken to other preschool owners to warn them of this woman and some of them already confirmed that they remember a woman acting this way. But they are not sure now if they lost anything because she came during a busy time. Her modus operandi is stealing cell phones because they can easily be slipped into her bag. In our case, she took I-Pods because she thought they were phones.

Please pray for the safety of our school as we pray for the safety of yours. Let’s also pray for this woman.

Teacher Tina

Nest Learning Center

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E-mail author at mommytalk@businessworks.com.ph