Alameda County DA charges Emeryville fake-nanny suspect

OAKLAND — A 60-year-old woman arrested last week in connection with a nanny scam was hit with three criminal counts, the Alameda County District Attorney’s office said Thursday.

Darlene Monticalvo was arrested last week in Kensington after media coverage led to a tip, Emeryville police said Friday.

Monticalvo was booked into Martinez County Jail on an Oakland police warrant charging her with cruelty to a child by inflicting injury and identity theft in connection with her pretending to be a nanny last June and badly injuring a 2-month-old child in her care, authorities said. At that time, she was held in lieu of $530,000 bail.

Court records list 22 prior felony convictions for Monticalvo in three counties stretching as far back as 1986, with at least five cases of identity theft and fraud since 2003 in which she posed as a nanny, authorities said.

Thursday’s charges reference the cruelty charge, a misdemeanor tied to a June 2018 case, and add two felonies for fraudulent possession of personal information, one connected to the June case and another from April 2018.

Monticalvo was previously convicted of the same felony charge in San Francisco Superior Court in August 2011.

She was in custody at Santa Rita Jail, with no listed bail or upcoming court dates, according to a county records check Thursday night.

Contact George Kelly at 408-859-5180.