Dorit Ungar Black, a founding partner of Holwell Shuster & Goldberg, calls it the summer of hell. The babysitter was supposed to be waiting for Liam, 5, and Sivan, 3, when the bus brought them home from summer camp. But instead, the place was deserted. “That was not a pleasant call to get,” she said.

Another babysitter ignored her calls and texts, so Black and her lawyer-husband, Barry Black, who has his own firm, Nelson Madden Black, raced home on the train to Westchester to be sure the children wouldn’t be returning to an empty house.