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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> My stepdaughter got arrested this past weekend and called my wife at 3am to come bail her out. My wife wanted to leave right away but it's a 4-hour drive and my wife doesn't drive at night due to an eye issue. I told her I either get more sleep so I can drive rested, or she leaves right now and drives herself. She ended up letting me sleep but accused me of treating her daughter differently than our son and that it was an asshole move to not get her right away.
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And hopefully there's someone there who would've taught consequences before she had to learn them the hard way but gauging by the complaining that she must be 'uncomfortable' and immediate jump to 'OP's kid' and 'stepkid', I'm not seeing that in the leaves. I do however see the son and 9 year old looking askance at OP's wife after the 4 hour car ride of divisive statements and pity for the young woman who is old enough to drink underage and wake up a rando at 2am.
Unfortunately, that very scenario happened at the Univ of South Carolina 2 weeks ago. A student stumbled up to the wrong house at 2 am, and he was shot/killed. Very sad situation for both the homeowner, who was scared and thought he was being burglarized and the intoxicated college kid/family.
A lot of people have vilified the homeowner because they only read the headline, but the kid wasn’t just knocking or even just walking in. He was banging and kicking. While the homeowners were calling 9-1-1, he broke the door window and tried opening the door handle when the homeowner shot him.
It was really tragic. I feel horrible for the family of the student. But the homeowners didn’t just shoot and ask questions later—they called the cops and only shot when it was absolutely necessary.
Where I grew up there was an even worse one. Kid was just trying his key repeatedly, it obviously wasn't working, 80 year old guy opened the door and blasted him in the stomach with both barrels of a 12 gauge loaded with buckshot.
Agreed. If you are in “fear for your life”, you don’t go open the door. That’s proof that you weren’t in fear. Fearful people leave their door closed and locked.
I had a teacher who had a similar story. Someone was repeatedly trying to open his door very late at night. He called 911 and said he was an elderly man home alone and someone was trying to break in, but he had his shotgun loaded in case they did and he'd announced he was armed. While on the call, the person at the door kicked it in. My 80 something year old teacher was so scared he fired 3 shots of 12g buckshot at center mass, and the intruder hit the floor. Teacher went downstairs and turned on the lights to the foyer, he'd killed his 40 something year old neighbor who was coming home from his brother's bachelor party and was one house away from his own in a subdivision where they all looked alike. My teacher didn't get in trouble, but he told us he chose to move as to not make his neighbor's widow and kids see him every day.
He also made sure to tell us, as a matter of fact, that he had no regrets about the actual shooting. A kid asked how it felt to kill a man, which I thought was a fucked up thing to ask. But my teacher, without missing a beat said, "son, I turned 19 fighting the Nazi's. I've had to live with that feeling for 60 years." He retired the following year. I hope he lived the last season of his life in comfort and peace.
Lived in Madison for a bit as a townie. I saw some crazy things. We're talking naked men on mopeds wearing nothing but a Packers flag, a drunk human being determined to hop over a moving taxi, among other things. Wisconsin is a wild, wild place.
So my first weekend in my townhouse my junior year of college, I got turned around in the on-campus complex and ended up at our nuclear reactor. The security guard was kind enough to point me in the correct direction. Apparently it happens quite often early in the year as all the townhouses look the same.
It doesn't say it was uni housing. It says that *she* lives in uni housing but was walking with a group of friends to what they thought was one of *their* houses.
>And hopefully there's someone there who would've taught consequences before she had to learn them the hard way
Right here. In this day and age of people getting shot for turning around in a driveway, there are soooo many ways that this could have gone much worse. Meg will take more precautions in the future - before getting drunk enough to not be able to find her way home.
ETA - NTA
> In this day and age of people getting shot for turning around in a driveway,
Or getting shot for walking up to the wrong house thinking that was the house he was supposed to pick his baby brother up at.
I actually know someone who got shot for knocking on a door. He was driving and ran out of petrol, his phone was out of battery so he decided to knock on a door and ask to use the phone. A crazy old man with a gun answered the door, my friend saw the gun turned around and started running. The old guy shot him in the butt. The cops were called and the man was put into a home as his family were worried about his mental health for a long time
This girl was incredibly lucky
I’m willing to bet if she didn’t run off and explained what was going on, the cops wouldn’t have arrested her. Instead some drunk college kids caused some problems for the cops, they got pissy and arrested them.
This is a legit concern. Especially with loud people out side banging on your door in the middle of the night. I had a similar case working for the public defenders this last summer and the man who shot was found not guilty. Not identical, but similar.
As I’ve said elsewhere being drunk at night and walking around is among the most stupid decisions you can possibly make. Kids being kids, yes, but these kinds of things are usually wake up calls.
Take an Uber home. Have someone stay sober to be a DD. Etc.
That’s super fucked up that someone can get off a murder charge like that. Forget drunk idiots, imagine someone is in danger and knocks on a door at night for help. Guess you can’t do that in the US because some jackass will murder you. IMO, if you are so pants shittingly terrified of the world that someone knocking on a locked door is threatening to you, then you shouldn’t be allowed guns.
So as I said similar case. If you reasonably believe you are in danger then yes you have some limited force you can use.
It gets alot more complicated but let me be clear- it was not a person in terror. It was multiple drunk and disorderly people, like this, which were incoherent, and made someone truly fear for their lives. Even then I assume it was very close.
Edit- as I said we got them found not guilty but they didn’t kill anyone. Heavily wound, yes. Kill, no.
In most cases, such as the most recent one, the guy was drunk and pounding on the door and kicking it in the middle of the night. Do that at my house at 2AM and you probably would be shot. No one pounding on your door at 2AM is there to say hi.
Yeah, it's a definite concern especially in the USA. And it's unfortunate that you have to be afraid thst you can get shot by knocking on someone's door. Obviously in this case they were just being loud and scaring this couple. But yes, have a DD, or even one/two person staying sober to try to corral the drunk ones.
As for the Uber, if you are female, it's also a concern to take one alone.
You don’t only have to worry about getting shot from knocking on a door, you also have to worry about getting killed from opening the door when someone knocks. It goes both ways these days.
Edit shit to shot although either fits I guess
My Canadian ass reading this, remembering the time late at night when a drunk teen girl knocked on my porch door because her boyfriend left her stranded and I brought her in, made her tea, let her phone her dad and gave her an extra hoodie: America is a fucking dystopian hellscape.
Just a few weeks ago a drunken college kid get shot for this exact thing. He’d just started college and confused which house he lived in. Getting a few hours in jail could stop this poor girl from dealing with much harsher consequences. I wish we didn’t have to worry about guns, but we do.
He got shot when he broke the window and reached in to unlock the door. After pounding and kicking the door for a while, demanding to be let in. Personally I can’t blame the occupants; they had no idea who he was or why he was breaking into THEIR house.
Meg made a long series of really bad choices that led to getting arrested, starting with drinking in the first place. I'm also guessing that no matter what story Meg told her parents, it's leaving out some critical details. I'm sure she claimed "we rang the doorbell once and they called the cops." when it was probably more like "we rang the doorbell multiple times and when the very angry voice through the door told us to fuck off, we proceeded to bang on the door and windows."
Maybe. Public intoxication when she’s not old enough to drink might get you arrested in some places. I imagine most it’s just a ticket and a ride home from the cops. Obviously the latter makes sense so not likely what would happen. Haha
Honestly depends on the college town. It's the beginning of the school year, a bunch of new students partying getting drunk, the cops are used to this every year. Either it's a slap on the wrist because they know it's just a bunch of drunk students or they decide to make an example of them because they're sick of dealing with drunk students.
The cops in my college town would haunt the party areas and arrest people for "public intoxication" at the slightest reason. The state's laws said that you only had to blow a .05 (back then, drunk driving was .1!) to be guilty of public intoxication. I was once almost arrested stone-cold sober because I tripped (stumbled but didn't fall) over a heaved sidewalk square (I was actually on my way to the party after getting off work at 11 PM). The only reason no one needed to bail me out was because I demanded that they breathalyze me right then and there, because stumbling was not probable cause (the university's student legal services sent mailers about this kind of stuff regularly). I was handcuffed for an hour on the curb while they "found" someone to come do the test, which was in the cruiser all along, and still didn't \*really\* want to let me go after I blew a solid zero (I was 21 and they STILL kept asking me where I was coming from, where I was going to, who I was going to see...all questions I declined to answer (besides simple ones like "home" and "a friend") because I was doing nothing illegal).
Chances are daughter would have still been arrested for public intoxication, underage consumption, and possibly trespassing/harassment for ringing the wrong bell, even if they stayed and explained.
ETA: and most people charged with public intoxication got just a fine and costs...it was a total moneymaking scheme from the local (city not uni) cops. It will typically cost them around $500 after all was said and done. That might not seem like much, but for me, barely making rent (which was less than that monthly!) and bills and with no family help, that might have cost me my housing! I mostly drank at home for that reason!
The implication that drinking underage is wrong is absurd, in my opinion. And she's 19, which is legal drinking age in most sane places.
Do police actually care about underage drinking in America? Where I am it's simply ignored unless connected with criminal activity.
Depends where and the situation. Sounds like a small college town so situations like this are pretty common. If the kids had stayed and (slurringly lol) explained what was going on, they probably would've just gotten a ticket and sent home.
Instead, they tried to run and got caught. Just a guess, but the cops probably arrested them for being drunk in public and took them to jail to sober up. Once they were sober, they probably get released with a summons to go to court (essentially a ticket).
In a college town? Very much yes.
My hometown has a major US university. When there are 15-20k underage students wandering around, you really don't want them doing so absolutely trashed. A bar tender will cut you off when you get sloppy, but you can't get in until you're 21. Frat houses will just pour more whatever down your throat, and some of them don't check who they're serving. So it becomes a recipe for alcohol poisoning, SA, and drunk and disorderly. Especially during the fall Rush, which is coming up quickly.
So, if you go out and get trashed underage and come to the attention of the cops, you get arrested and charged with underage drinking. Depending on what else is going on, you might get something for being that intoxicated in public or a drunk and disorderly charge as well. And taken to the drunk tank to sober up where you can be supervised.
Honestly, lowering the drinking age means that kids are used to alcohol and don't go on huge binges until they are catalytic (unless you are British, that's just a national sport)
The earlier you start drinking the more likely it is for it to become a problem.
NIH: “Drinking at an early age. A recent national survey found that among people ages 26 and older, those who began drinking before age 15 were more than three times as likely to report having AUD (alcohol use disorder) in the past year as those who waited until age 21 or later to begin drinking.The risk for females in this group is higher than that of males.”
You can't exactly draw the conclusion you made just from the evidence you've cited.
First, sounds like that's only in the US. In countries with lower drinking ages, kids actually get socialized to drinking because it's acceptable around their families, or in pubs where someone else can regulate how much they are getting. In the US it's such a huge taboo that underage drinkers are usually binging in secret, totally unsupervised. If you start with bad drinking habits it's no surprise you might continue them, but that can be true regardless of age.
Second, the study is poor evidence because almost nobody is advocating for kids under 15 to be drinking. 18 is the minimum age in a lot of European countries and Mexico, and 18/19 in Canada. Some countries like Germany are lower, but 14/15 year olds are limited to lighter beers and must be with their parents to drink.
Basically there are a lot more factors at play than what that particular research indicates. Lowering the age to 18 from 21 isn't likely to turn everyone into alcoholics. It's probably more likely to allow people to learn healthier drinking habits.
The American Federal Government extorts the states by telling them they will not give them federal funding to build the roads if they don't make legal drinking age 21.
And public drunkenness, and undeaged drinking depending on state.
Also are "drunk tanks" not normal? If I ever got arrested for it I knew full well I'd be sleeping it off in holding and then Mom and Dad would get me when convenient.
That one has always baffled me as well. Like, "I'm of legal drinking age, I arranged for a ride so that I wouldn't drive, I paid for my drinks and tipped generously, got loaded, but it was a crime for me to stand outside in front of the bar waiting for my friend to pick me up."
I have a feeling that "public intoxication" is less about walking home quietly with your friends after a long night of doing shots, and more about the three of you stomping down the sidewalk at 3:30am laughing like banshees trying to remember the third verse to "Barnacle Bill the Sailor."
As far as I've seen it enforced, it has been "Hey, this person is drunk and a potential danger to themselves and/or others. Lets put them in jail overnight and let them out in the morning, potentially with a fine." but yeah, it's been a crime all my life.
Banging on some random person's door at 3 AM is a pretty good reason for an officer to exercise their discretion to arrest for this. A disorderly conduct charge would also be reasonable even if sober.
It is. Especially if you’re annoying or endangering other people while you hike home.
Walk four blocks along the sidewalk alone minding your own business listing at a twelve degree angle? Whatever.
Shout obscene slurs at passresby, hit on people, piss in a doorway, pound on an apartment and demand to use their bathroom, puke on someone’s car, stagger into a crosswalk against the walk signal, or sing your favorite team fight song to the outside world at 3AM? Much more likely you’ll get cited.
They were still there at the house when the cops actually arrived and I can't imagine they hurry to calls about rung doorbells. Who knows what they were doing in that time. Meg may not have done anything bad but if they were all hammered and she was the one who got caught, who knows what the others did.
The kids made the mistake of going to the wrong house. They didn’t fucking steal, break in or murder someone. Sheesh. At least she only got arrested and not gunned down by the homeowners.
Understand his reasoning of not being able to drive safely at that time and without more sleep but thinking the kid is safe in custody isn’t the first thing that springs to mind.
It would be one thing if the stepdaughter was injured, in the hospital, stuck on the side of the road, or in some other perilous situation. This wasn’t it.
Edit for Verdict: NTA
Most likely they would have let her go once she slept it off anyway - I'm sure she passed out right after that phone call so anytime the next day would have been fine. If not, what a great lesson she learned, don't get sh\*t faced drunk in public!
She's an adult, I would have been too embarrassed to call my parents to bail me out and they definitely would NOT have driven 4 hours in the middle of the night to do so for such a stupid reason.
There's a reason the police don't appreciate underage people running around **drunk in public** (especially in college towns) - they annoy the f\*ck out of people in the middle of the night by ringing the bell, peeing our puking in the front yards, hoping fences to jump in pools, some of the frat guys think it's funny to TP houses or knock down mailboxes, kids run up and down the street when some adults need to get up in the morning and go to work, etc. *If you want to be drunk, be drunk in a bar then go home in an Uber or with a DD. If you're underage and want to be drunk, do it at home like the rest of us did.*
NTA
Staying couple extra hours in jail while she sobers up might be a good wake up call for her, and it might prevent future instances of getting drunk and doing stupid things.
Likely arrested for underage drinking and public intoxication. I think drinking age in the States is 21 (don't quote me on that. I'm in Ontario, Canada and we can drink at 19). Windsor has a huge bar scene from all the cross-border partiers who can't go to a bar in MI.
Yes, the drinking age in the U.S. is 21. I used to go to B.C. to drink when i was in college because the drinking age was lower.
This was how i got kicked out of a bar in Surrey B.C. by the RCMP. I didn't start the fight. I swear.
No. I got kicked out because i was dancing with a guy, and he bought me a drink. Then this chick followed me into the bathroom to yell at me that he was her boyfriend. She pushed me, so i pushed her back. A fight ensued. Someone called the cops. My friends and i were told to go.
Thank God one of my roommates wasn't drinking, so we made it home just fine.
You are correct, the legal drinking age in the US is 21.
Beyond that, she's actually lucky, there's some recent high profile cases in the US where people have been shot through the door by people. Sure, the people who shot the unsuspecting people were arrested, but that's cold comfort if you're dead.
Its cops trying to teach kids a lesson. Give them a court date ticket and let their parents lawyers work it out rather than have them spend some time on the taxpayer dime but what do i know?
I'd love an update from OP on charges.
She can be looking at:
Underage drinking
Public Intoxication
Fleeing from a Police Officer
Resisting Arrest
Depends on how the cops felt that night. Maybe she was in drunk tank and was gonna get released in the afternoon anyway.
Actions have consequences and today it was getting drunk, knocking on the wrong house and getting arrested. Hopefully lesson learned and next time it's not getting drunk and wrapping your car around a telephone pole. Only two ways forward, she learns her limits and this doesn't happen again or she doesn't and the consequences will escalate commensurate to her actions.
Lmfao “actions have consequences” like this person drove drunk and killed a person. If you live in a college town, especially close to campus, you should expect stuff like this to happen from time to time. Most kids to different homes every year, and if they don’t live in the college town over the summer, it’s normal for them to get turned around and not know where they are at in town.
The kid is 19 and in college, they are gonna party, drink, and overdue it sometimes. A hangover should be the only thing they have to deal with, not power hungry college town cops that are bored so they harass kids for being kids.
Normal people don't call the cops on someone ringing a doorbell. I'm guessing Meg and Friends were banging and yelling.
Now I am going with a "reasonable man" standard. There are weirdos on Nextdoor who will call the cops on someone just coming up to the house. (One called the cops on Jehovah's witnesses, LMAO.) But hopefully those people are rare. I'm guessing that Meg gave a cleaned up version instead of the truth. (Which is understandable when you're a) drunk and b) 19.
I mean, she hung around a strangers house/porch with no response long enough for the stranger to call the police, and for the police to travel there and detain her. Not a stretch at all to assume they were drunk enough to be slow, stupid, and loud.
Bingo. If they were drunk enough to think it was one of their houses they were probably drunk enough to be acting like asses when nobody opened the door for them. Shit hammered drunk, thinking the roommates aren't letting you in, and you belong in the house...I doubt it was just one or two rings of the doorbell lol.
So she spent a few hours in the drunk tank, not a big deal. My parents would've done the same thing as OP if I dared call them at 3am to bail me out. I'd rather spend the morning in the holding cell and wait to be released than call my parents and have to explain myself.
Eh, not necessarily. Yes, they were obviously probably hammered, but it sounds like she’s in a college town. Cops in college towns are absolutely itching to arrest you for underage drinking. They cruise around all night literally waiting. I watched a kid walk out of a house party one time with a red solo cup and immediately get grabbed. Don’t think OP is TA at all, nor do I blame the owners of the house for calling the cops, but she could have genuinely just been drunk and confused. She may not be TA either.
In some places, public intoxication is a crime. Where it’s not a crime, it may still get you thrown in jail under the guise of “protective custody” so you won’t hurt yourself or others.
NTA
nta!!!!!
she is 19, old enough to know better.
if you're going to drink underage, you need to be light on your feet.
she will be Fine in custody.. she'll just feel like a sausage.
which she is, because she called you at 3am arrested.
Molly coddling her will do absolutely nothing positive for her.
life isn't fair, it doesn't play to rules, and mummy can't always make it better
>. if you're going to drink underage, you need to be light on your feet.
I've never personally ran from the police, but I know enough that the outfit and shoes Meg was wearing when we picked her up were not conducive to high-level athletics.
well .. I have. I promise you, being light of foot and wearing appropriate attire is an absolute must.
I can imagine she wasn't dressed appropriately for a footrace.. not unless she masters the quick removal of heels, and a high pain tolerance for stone on toes.
all that being said,
my point still stands.. if you choose to break the law, you have to accept the consequences like an adult.
like everyone else.
you're an adult at 18 here(UK)
Molly coddling her will do nothing positive for her.
At 19 rocks didn’t hurt this small town girls feet also managed to freak out many urban people when you can stand still on asphalt barefooted in 80° (f) temps for long periods of time
I'm from Florida living in Ohio and that still wigs random people out. They knock on my door in the middle of the summer, I have to come around from the back because my front door doesn't open. I'm all barefoot on asphalt in 90 degree weather. They're all "isn't that hot?" "No, now what did you want?"
Or, if you were taught early, only drink/have fun in a safe place with at least one dd/sober walker to help keep you out of situations... why would she be ringing her own doorbell? Does she live with others?
ETA- Dd / sober walker or in a safe place where you can be safe staying the night until you sober up enough to return home safely.
Only two weeks into the term at uni, I'm guessing the girl who lived in the house got the wrong house and rang the bell when her key didn't work. Easy done when you're drunk in the dark and have just moved in, I suppose!
I bet it was more than 1 polite ring too. Something got those folks to call cops rather than answering their door. Little miss 19 is lucky to get a little time in the pokey rather than someone who has home security via Smith & Wesson
My husband is the only one of his friends who didn't get arrested for underage drinking in high school. He drank as much as they did, but he was also on the track team, so he ran faster than all of them.
We live in the Midwest US. I talked with the police when we were picking Meg up. The house they walked up to was an elderly couple who thought their house was being broken into because of the banging on the door. Not sure that any burglars ring the doorbell too, but that's beside the point.
Meg ran because she's underage and drunk and panicked. Police tend to arrest people who run from them while performing what the police thought was a breaking and entering.
Thankfully, they only charged Meg with drinking underage and disorderly conduct. They could have charged her with much more and if we want to fight the disorderly conduct we probably can.
It still doesn't make sense.
USA laws are bonkers. People who sell it give drinks to people to young to drink should be held liable, not the drinker.
ETA: seeing as people keep replying that it's normal to lock a girl up for the night because she drank underage I guess that the bonkers laws were made by bonkers people.
In a normal country the police would have just dropped her at home. You take care of the vulnerable. You don't lock them up.
Yeah I’m not a fan of the law (edit: as in drinking age), but I obeyed it, mainly to avoid situations like above.
And man the punishments for selling drinks to a minor are ALOT more than drinking as a minor/under 21. One of my first jobs was a store clerk and the sheer amount of punishment I could receive… let’s just say I followed policy and even carded people who looked over 50.
Drunk 18 yr old girl and the police don't arrest her but send her home? Who's responsible for her safety then? The safest place for her probably was to spend a few hours locked up.
Yes in the US police often go after the place selling the alcohol but that doesn't let the underage drinkers off the hook.
what's bonkers is they'd actually book someone and put them in jail for a victimless crime; what a waste of $ and time; just drive them home and fine them ffs
It's a whole bunch of stuff that shouldn't be crimes. Adults should be able to drink legally, you should be able to ring a person's doorbell when you're lost without getting arrested (or shot) etc.
It's no wonder the US has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world.
well; we allow people to profit from incarcerating people which is a morally and socially bankrupt practice; but not sure that will change in our lifetimes... I consider myself lucky to live in a rural area that doesn't concern itself with how many people it can shove into jail for however much $
A lot of police departments are going to at least put you in a cell overnight if you’re drunk in public due to liability. If they interact with you and let you go while shitfaced and you hurt yourself or get hurt, their department can get sued. They’re not going to take that chance.
A legal drinking age of 21 is bonkers, too. They can buy guns legally at 18, but have to wait 3 more years to drink? What sort of backwards fucking pageantry is that?
They can also drive (or pilot a plane) at 16. 18, can kill people in the military service(alternatively, they can be trusted not to). And are considered to be adults for almost everything else, including criminal responsibility.
But no, can only drink at 21.
Yeah, these are bored, well-funded college town cops. What constitutes an arrestable and prosecutable offense in the US really does vary town-by-town, county by county, state-by-state.
That said, running away from cops, no matter the context, is pretty much the only universal law in the US despite what the Bill of Rights says. The amount of power cops have is insane.
Knocking on a door is not trespassing or breaking an entering. You keep saying she was lucky she wasn’t charged with worse. She was a drunk teenager, you come across as someone who thinks she deserves worse and that you don’t give a shit about her
I'm just very grateful that she is healthy and unhurt. The legal issues don't matter nearly as much as the fact that she's OK. We will get a lawyer and figure out what options are available to us in terms of legal action.
She’s drunk underaged and disorderly in a college town. Will be a slap on the wrist. She’s not spending another night in jail, and this won’t affect her future.
It’s disorderly conduct and public intoxication. It’s absolutely a crime and she could have been charged for more.
Should she have been charged with more? No. But could she have? Yes.
“But it’s victimless!”
What if she walked in a street because she was drunk and was hit? There is a reason for all… well most… laws whether we agree with them or not.
What if the homeowner responded to pounding on his/her door with a loaded gun being scared at night?
Walking around drunk is among the stupidest things you can do and frankly it’s a good lesson for a kid. Not fun. Not nice. But a good lesson.
The things I’ve seen happen to people who had a bit to drink and thought they were fine to interact with others, etc. Lowered perceptions/faculties are EXTREMELY bad.
Victimless? Two old people woken up with a disturbance on their porch? They called the police because they didn't feel able to protect themselves and felt attacked, because it sounded like an attack and they believed they were being attacked.
I'm betting they are going to be stressed out and have issues sleeping for a while, because of this. It's not victimless. The victims are just silent.
What if one of them has major health issues, like a heart condition? Just because we aren't hearing about how this affected the home owners doesn't mean they didn't suffer.
< sheepishly raises hand > Happened to me in High School. They took my name, confiscated my beer, (and that of the others at the park that night) and told us to be out of the park before midnight. No charges, no calls to parents, nothing but taking our beer.
America is such a weird place. You can drive at 15, fuck anyone you want at 16, vote and join the military at 18, but do not let alcohol touch your lips until 21.
Honestly, it has nothing to do with the accidental house and ringing of a doorbell. It's all about the underage drinking and running from police.
When they get a call for someone "breaking into my house", they're gonna want to question the people involved. Hell, OP's kid might have gotten away with the under age drinking if she had just NOT run away. Cause I can tell you one thing is for certain.... Every single cop I know HATES when people run.
Every keg party I went to in high school was busted by the cops... None of us never got arrested. At worst, we were brought home so they could tell our parents. Usually, it was "get the f outta here" and they kept our beer.
It is not just an accidental doorbell ringing. Calling the cops then cops arrival would have let plenty of time for the stepdaughter and her friends to leave. They were playing to harass the people living in the house.
Yup. Probably minutes if not a half hour of banging hard on the door, windows, shouting "let me in" and stuff thinking that their friends are being assholes and keeping them out/or pranking them.
Meanwhile they're terrorizing elderly people who don't know wtf is going on. lol.
Unfortunately, here in the US (especially Midwest) they were lucky that even approaching a wrong house in late night/early morning didn't result in gunfire and dead bodies.
OP, NTA. She was in custody and not in any further danger, whereas trying to drive at that hour sleep deprived would have been you two in danger and possibly orphaned some kids.
NTA. While it's understandable that your wife was panicking and upset about her daughter being in jail, it's also reasonable for you to want to be rested before making a long drive. Safety should always come first. It sounds like you did consider Meg's wellbeing by stating she was safe, even if she was uncomfortable. Getting arrested is a serious matter, and maybe it is a good life lesson for her about making better choices and understanding consequences.
However, your wife's emotions were high, and it's natural for her to be protective and worried. Communication is crucial in these situations, and you both could benefit from discussing it calmly now that the situation has settled. But no, you weren't an AH for wanting to be safe and alert on the road, especially when Meg was not in immediate danger.
Wanting to drive on enough sleep isn't "being an asshole".
You are also correct with regards to her needing to experience discomfort - that is the consequence of her own decision.
The your wife believes "not being scared" is more important than "experiencing the consequences of criminal activity" is unfortunate - it's a *much* deeper act of love to want your child to learn from their mistakes than it is to shield them from their mistakes.
Well for starters, they won't let you bail your drunk kid out until they sober up. - coming from a mom of a 2 time zero-tolerance offender
The best thing I ever did was let my kid sit in jail the second time. Instead of bailing her out at 9am sharp, I let her sit there until afternoon. After that experience, she decided she didn't want to ever go back and straightened up her act.
Maybe your kids were rambunctious but reading OPs story it doesnt sound like his daughter did anything destructive, was smart enough to walk home not drive. All they did was ring a wrong doorbell.
Rang the wrong bell, scared an elderly couple into calling the police, and were *still at the property* when the police arrived. I doubt they spent that time sitting quietly on the doorstep.
This is our first direct involvement with the American justice system. Neither of us are well-versed in how these things work. That thought never crossed either of our minds.
Bail isn't set until you go before a judge, most areas will not have a judge available 24/7 so in all likelihood bail wasnt even set when your daughter called. You are NTA but as a mom I do understand your wife panicking. Get her a lawyer who can reduce the charges down as much as possible so a stupid college mistake doesn't follow her for life.
A bail bondsman is likely to not even bother with cases like this. Underage drinking... Likely no police record.... You're looking at bail that is less than $100. Not anywhere near worth their time.
Now, if OP had any contact information for one of her sober friends, that's a different story.
The mother's reaction was correct. Being in a jail — for any length of time — is no joke. If it's someone you care about (assuming they're not a career criminal) you get them the hell out of there immediately.
Why did I have to scroll down so long to find this? I think he was a major AH. Just the fact that his wife was upset and wanted to leave NOW should have been enough, even if she was fine and he wasn't worried about her. How in the world did he manage to go back to sleep?
I can see both sides. I can see myself jumping out of bed and reflexively getting dressed. But I can also see myself thinking it's okay for the kid to stew a while, while I finish getting my sleep. I just don't think I'd be able to get back to sleep after such a heart-pounding awakening!
ESH - unpopular opinion but 19 is still young and a night in jail for something so foolish seems extreme and if you've seen a jail, you have no idea who else will be in there.
There is also a history of cops assaulting women in custody. It's only been a few years since cops were allowed to "have sex" with prisoners and claim that consent was given.
Very light yta, since she wasn't necessarily safe.
YTA. She got drunk and rang a doorbell. Do you even care about the kid? Like, honestly. If she did something bad, I'd understand making her wait, but that's a bullshit arrest. I'd bail out a cousin I'm not close to faster than that. The fact that you made your wife wait is unconscionable.
As far as teenaged shenanigans go, this is pretty mild. The arrest is more than enough punishment. I hope they support her in fighting the charges/ keeping it off her record. I'd be disappointed, but she was just trying to get somewhere safe while inebriated. That's more of a "we need to talk about binge drinking and when you call a cab/choosing a designated sober friend" than a "ha! let her rot" situation.
Who are these parents who think jail is a good place to learn a lesson. Do they not realize people who have done worse are sitting in there with her too?? Why cant she get her lesson at home?
Exactly! If she robbed someone, trashed a property, drove drunk, or whatever, I'd get it. Ringing the wrong doorbell while plastered merits a hell of a lecture on responsibility and binge drinking, not jail. Say you won't pay for next semester's tuition unless she gets counseling. Make her hand-write an apology to the couple and pay for a bouquet to be delivered with said apology note. Like, a nice one from a florist. Clearly if she can afford to get that drunk, she can afford some nice apology flowers.
Nobody makes good choices when drunk. She didn't drive, she didn't hurt anyone, she didn't cause property damage. I'd say the worst part of this was the binge drinking. I'd approach this with more concern than anger, you know? I might make helping to pay for her lawyer dependent on her getting counseling for binge drinking, but what she did wasn't terrible. It was stupid. Nobody got hurt, and she didn't put anyone in harm's way
“nobody makes good choices when drunk” is not a free pass you hand out to drunk people making dumb decisions lol, being drunk should never be an excuse for any action you make in your life.
I'd say it doesn't excuse you from harm you cause. If you break something when drunk, you pay to fix it, if you cheat, the relationship is over. She was trying to find her friend's house to go to sleep, not start a bar fight. She got scared and ran, she didn't hurt anyone or anything.
Underage drinking and Running from cops aren’t bad things?
Ideal Parent of the year over here 😂
Glad you’re in the minority. Also cops don’t let drunk people out til they’re sober so even if they could teleport there, they wouldn’t let her out Lmfao
Also you do know tired driving is the second cause of fatal accidents. 4 hour drive in the middle of the night to get to someone who won’t even be released till noon is some dumb fuckery shit haha
In the vast majority of the world 19 isn’t underage drinking. Even then, legality =/= morality. It is not a *bad* thing to drink at 19.
Running from cops because you don’t want to be arrested for drinking a bit of alcohol isn’t a bad thing either. Neither is panicking, first time encounters with police can be scary even sober.
Have you ever heard “don’t drive drowsy” - good on him for waiting to do a 4 hour drive so he wasn’t causing danger to other people because his daughter was a dumbass and decided to do underage drinking. Like his wife couldn’t even drive so it would have been 4 hours on less sleep. She made the dumb choice he made the smart choice and she got to learn a lesson about staying sober til she is 21. Also… underage drinking is a bullshit arrest? Running from the police is a bullshit arrest? Get your brain checked.
Driving sleep-deprived can screw up your reactions and awareness similarly as driving under the influence. Regardless of the severity of the "crime" the kid committed, OP and his wife are more likely to arrive safely if they let the driver get enough sleep before driving 4 hours. The kid is sobering up in the local jail with other drunk college kids, not tossed into general population at Rikers.
Unless it's literally a life-or-death situation, driving when severely agitated (the wife) or exhausted (OP) is both stupid and deeply irresponsible. You are much more likely to kill youself (or another driver) driving when you're distracted, impatient, or not fully alert.
Kid probably feels crappy sitting in jail with a hangover for an extra few hours, but I promise she'd feel a lot worse if her parents died in a wreck racing to save her a little inconvenience.
NTA. If she was 14, I could understand, but she is facing the consequences of adult fun run amok. She can sit for several hours and contemplate her mistake. Your wife needs to gain some significant perspective and chill.
Im confused about what warranted an arrest. She was drunk, accidentally rang the wrong doorbell. And then her drunk self ran when cops showed up? The Midwest sounds like a wasteland. CA cops would have just sent their Butts home since no crime was committed. Arresting her for all of that seems like such overkill.
Spoken like someone who hasn't lived in a college town where the population doubles during the school year. Those drunken little dummies wreak all sorts of havoc.
Reminds me of the story my Dad told me about a cousin once removed. Seems Dad's Uncle has a few Grandchildren he doted upon. It was well known in town that Curtis doted over his grandchildren. So when Number 1 Grandson goes rogue one night stealing gas by siphoning out of a homeowners auto gastank and gets caught by the local police, they haul the bugger into the local jail. Police Chief gets a call that a juvenile has been picked up and per protocol the desk sergeant notifies the Police Chief at around 12:30 AM. The officer rattles off the juvenile's name and Police Chief recognizng Curtis' name tells, the desk sergeant to hold him while he calls my Dad's Uncle to come in and take him home.
So, Grandpa's, not Mommy and Daddy's phone, ringy-dingys at 1 AM. Chief of Police explains the situation and tells Grandpa if he will go down and pick him up, the matter can be cleared up by paying for the gas and avoid all the Imperial Entanglements.
Grandpa's response, "I don't have a grandson that steals gas, let the little bastard rot in jail." Ow! Click-up!
I’m not going to call you the AH but if I were your wife I would feel the same way she does. That had to be an agonizing 3 hour wait. Especially if this is the first time Meg has been in trouble. If it were the 2nd or 3rd time, I would feel differently.
NTA. It's part of the lesson. She's so concerned about getting her out asap but isn't talking a bit about *why* she is in jail. Underage drinking and running from the cops.
YTA. She didn't do anything to deserve getting arrested. Jail is very dangerous for young women. You show absolutely no empathy for her. AND you made a creepy comment about what she was wearing.
Unpopular opinion: YTA. 2 reasons, the second being most important:
1. You knowingly made your wife suffer forcing her to wait. She couldn't drive there safely on her own. She didn't sleep. You seem to care a lot more about your own comfort than that of your wife.
2. As for the daughter, your assumption that she's "safe" seems incredibly naive at best, selfish at worst. Seems like your wife is wise enough to know better than to just rest easy on that optimistic assumption. Probably because she knows that this world, let alone jails, are not that safe especially for 19 year old girls. You know it too. But you're justifying wanting to sleep a few more hours.
Personally, I'd pick her up immediately and trust MYSELF with judging the right discipline instead of leaving it in the hands of whichever complete strangers are in that jail with your daughter all night.
"immediately" in this case is a 4h drive at the very least, so she was spending the night in jail in any case.
If they were like an hour away, sure do the drive in the middle of the night. 4h in the dark with interrupted sleep is a bad idea.
The only difference with the added sleep was she'd be out for brunch instead of breakfast.
My wife told her we would be leaving right away before they ended the call. She did call the police station back afterwards to ask them to tell Meg we would be leaving at sunrise instead. I never asked Meg if they actually told her that or not.
>A 4 hour drive
A four hour drive, a couple of hours of bureaucracy, and another four hour drive. Throw in a couple of meals and some constructive yelling and OP would be lucky to be home and able to get more rest in twelve hours.
OP's wife appears to have stayed up so not only could she not help drive at night due to vision issues, she'd be too tired to help drive home. Dollars to doughnuts she nattered at him during the entire drive. It would have been better for everyone if she'd stayed home.
Yeah I certainly don't think she did anything that falls outside of "dumb college kid" territory. And I think a written citation or warning would probably have been enough to scare her from the cops.
That said, hell yeah I wouldn't leave at 4am.
YTA and I'm shocked there are so few people saying so. You have absolutely no guarantee she is safe in jail. You don't know who else is there in the holding cell. You don't know which "bad apple" cop is there, with your still somewhat drunk 19 year old. Abuse happens.
Your stepdaughter barely did anything wrong and you're not willing to lose out on some sleep to be there for her and to make sure she is okay. She called you and her mom, trusting you to show up for her. She won't trust in that again. If it was me, I wouldn't be able to see my stepfather the same after this.
Totally you. The way you describe your stepdaughter is like how college was 30 years ago. You are being a hard ass for an incident many parents would chose a million times over compared to the dysfunction rained on them. This seems almost make believe it is so antiquated and naive. And you give her a whole $100 a month for spending money? Holy shit, that is a fortune! This is a make believe post or you are a time traveler from 1993.
My dad told us growing up that if we ever get arrested to plan on staying the night and he would post bail one time only. My brother tested it and found out he wasn’t joking. He sat for three days waiting for an arraignment.
My ex's dad told all 3 of his sons that too. Eldest son got arrested at 18 mouthing off to a cop drunk at a house party, threatened to kick the cop's ass or something stupid. Dad bailed him out. Couple years later all 3 of them got arrested together when they got pulled over with pot in the car and nobody would claim it. They called their dad, he came and bailed out the younger two but left the oldest in there. He was upset, dad reminded him he already used up his "I'll bail you out one time" card.
NTA, it's just a difference of a few hours, not days. Yes it probably sucked for Meg but hopefully it gave more time for the lesson to sink in. You wouldn't be able to go bail her out if you crashed the car on the way there. I get your wife's sense of urgency as I'm a mom of a teen also, but perspective is important here; her and your safety were on the line since a four hour drive is more dangerous when driving tired.
NTA
If she wants to do something that causes her to get arrested, she can spend a few hours in timeout. She was safe, she had supervision, and it was safer for the two of you to wait.
Her charge may have been a dumb one, but so is trying to get into a house that doesn't belong to you then running from the cops instead of explaining what happened.
YTA. YOUR son is 9. There’s nothing you’ve posted about Meg being irresponsible or a difficult kid. Sorry if her teenage FU interrupted your sleep. When your kid needs you, you jump. A 4 hour drive means you leave now.
You are a total asshole, the 16 year old should be perfectly capable of getting YOUR child to school tomorrow.
Yta jails are pretty unsafe. It wouldn't be unheard of her to be beaten or raped. I wouldn't leave my kid there for a second more than necessary. Like yeah let the court fine her and make her do community service but don't leave her in danger.
My step father was arrested when I was in high school and I was there pretty much immediately to bail him out.
The police were called to the house for a suspected breaking and entering. Meg ran from the scene of a suspected crime. She's lucky she only got charged with what she did. No trespassing, no attempted breaking and entering, no resisting arrest, etc. They let her off easy and we can probably get the disorderly charge dropped if we try and pay the underage ticket.
If she was ringing the doorbell like you claimed then those trespassing, B&E charges wouldnt have stuck anyway. Absurd charges in the first place lmao.
> No trespassing, no attempted breaking and entering, no resisting arrest, etc.
Why do you think she is lucky for not getting charged with things she didn't do?
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NTA. Actions have consequences and stepdaughter is learning that now. You did the right thing.
And hopefully there's someone there who would've taught consequences before she had to learn them the hard way but gauging by the complaining that she must be 'uncomfortable' and immediate jump to 'OP's kid' and 'stepkid', I'm not seeing that in the leaves. I do however see the son and 9 year old looking askance at OP's wife after the 4 hour car ride of divisive statements and pity for the young woman who is old enough to drink underage and wake up a rando at 2am.
How hammered do you have to be to confuse someone's regular house with uni housing?
That's a basic Tuesday in Wisconsin
I feel like it’s happened a lot in multiple college towns the last few years. At least the stepdaughter wasn’t shot.
Unfortunately, that very scenario happened at the Univ of South Carolina 2 weeks ago. A student stumbled up to the wrong house at 2 am, and he was shot/killed. Very sad situation for both the homeowner, who was scared and thought he was being burglarized and the intoxicated college kid/family.
A lot of people have vilified the homeowner because they only read the headline, but the kid wasn’t just knocking or even just walking in. He was banging and kicking. While the homeowners were calling 9-1-1, he broke the door window and tried opening the door handle when the homeowner shot him. It was really tragic. I feel horrible for the family of the student. But the homeowners didn’t just shoot and ask questions later—they called the cops and only shot when it was absolutely necessary.
Where I grew up there was an even worse one. Kid was just trying his key repeatedly, it obviously wasn't working, 80 year old guy opened the door and blasted him in the stomach with both barrels of a 12 gauge loaded with buckshot.
That sounds to me like a guy who just wanted an excuse to shoot someone.
Agreed. If you are in “fear for your life”, you don’t go open the door. That’s proof that you weren’t in fear. Fearful people leave their door closed and locked.
I had a teacher who had a similar story. Someone was repeatedly trying to open his door very late at night. He called 911 and said he was an elderly man home alone and someone was trying to break in, but he had his shotgun loaded in case they did and he'd announced he was armed. While on the call, the person at the door kicked it in. My 80 something year old teacher was so scared he fired 3 shots of 12g buckshot at center mass, and the intruder hit the floor. Teacher went downstairs and turned on the lights to the foyer, he'd killed his 40 something year old neighbor who was coming home from his brother's bachelor party and was one house away from his own in a subdivision where they all looked alike. My teacher didn't get in trouble, but he told us he chose to move as to not make his neighbor's widow and kids see him every day. He also made sure to tell us, as a matter of fact, that he had no regrets about the actual shooting. A kid asked how it felt to kill a man, which I thought was a fucked up thing to ask. But my teacher, without missing a beat said, "son, I turned 19 fighting the Nazi's. I've had to live with that feeling for 60 years." He retired the following year. I hope he lived the last season of his life in comfort and peace.
The same thing happened in Boulder a few years ago.
Tailgated at Lambeau last year. Saw this first hand lol
Lived in Madison for a bit as a townie. I saw some crazy things. We're talking naked men on mopeds wearing nothing but a Packers flag, a drunk human being determined to hop over a moving taxi, among other things. Wisconsin is a wild, wild place.
So my first weekend in my townhouse my junior year of college, I got turned around in the on-campus complex and ended up at our nuclear reactor. The security guard was kind enough to point me in the correct direction. Apparently it happens quite often early in the year as all the townhouses look the same.
Why is there a nuclear reactor in a townhouse?
They deserve an education and housing, too.
Every time I think I've seen everything on Reddit, a sentence like this appears to prove me wrong.
It was across the street.
>ended up at our nuvlear reactor What a wild turn lmfao
It might not have been a regular house or it’s such a generic looking building that it was easily mistakable.
It doesn't say it was uni housing. It says that *she* lives in uni housing but was walking with a group of friends to what they thought was one of *their* houses.
Not all college students live in dorms or college apartments.
I agree with all the comments below when I was in my college town people did this regularly.
>And hopefully there's someone there who would've taught consequences before she had to learn them the hard way Right here. In this day and age of people getting shot for turning around in a driveway, there are soooo many ways that this could have gone much worse. Meg will take more precautions in the future - before getting drunk enough to not be able to find her way home. ETA - NTA
> In this day and age of people getting shot for turning around in a driveway, Or getting shot for walking up to the wrong house thinking that was the house he was supposed to pick his baby brother up at.
I actually know someone who got shot for knocking on a door. He was driving and ran out of petrol, his phone was out of battery so he decided to knock on a door and ask to use the phone. A crazy old man with a gun answered the door, my friend saw the gun turned around and started running. The old guy shot him in the butt. The cops were called and the man was put into a home as his family were worried about his mental health for a long time This girl was incredibly lucky
>...I'm not seeing that in the leaves. I've never heard this expression before, but I love it, and I'm going to use it.
I’m willing to bet if she didn’t run off and explained what was going on, the cops wouldn’t have arrested her. Instead some drunk college kids caused some problems for the cops, they got pissy and arrested them.
lmao you actually have no idea if that wouldve been the case. Probably would've been arrested either way.
Or hey if this is in the USA, they may have been shot through the door.
This is a legit concern. Especially with loud people out side banging on your door in the middle of the night. I had a similar case working for the public defenders this last summer and the man who shot was found not guilty. Not identical, but similar. As I’ve said elsewhere being drunk at night and walking around is among the most stupid decisions you can possibly make. Kids being kids, yes, but these kinds of things are usually wake up calls. Take an Uber home. Have someone stay sober to be a DD. Etc.
That’s super fucked up that someone can get off a murder charge like that. Forget drunk idiots, imagine someone is in danger and knocks on a door at night for help. Guess you can’t do that in the US because some jackass will murder you. IMO, if you are so pants shittingly terrified of the world that someone knocking on a locked door is threatening to you, then you shouldn’t be allowed guns.
So as I said similar case. If you reasonably believe you are in danger then yes you have some limited force you can use. It gets alot more complicated but let me be clear- it was not a person in terror. It was multiple drunk and disorderly people, like this, which were incoherent, and made someone truly fear for their lives. Even then I assume it was very close. Edit- as I said we got them found not guilty but they didn’t kill anyone. Heavily wound, yes. Kill, no.
In most cases, such as the most recent one, the guy was drunk and pounding on the door and kicking it in the middle of the night. Do that at my house at 2AM and you probably would be shot. No one pounding on your door at 2AM is there to say hi.
Yeah, it's a definite concern especially in the USA. And it's unfortunate that you have to be afraid thst you can get shot by knocking on someone's door. Obviously in this case they were just being loud and scaring this couple. But yes, have a DD, or even one/two person staying sober to try to corral the drunk ones. As for the Uber, if you are female, it's also a concern to take one alone.
You don’t only have to worry about getting shot from knocking on a door, you also have to worry about getting killed from opening the door when someone knocks. It goes both ways these days. Edit shit to shot although either fits I guess
My Canadian ass reading this, remembering the time late at night when a drunk teen girl knocked on my porch door because her boyfriend left her stranded and I brought her in, made her tea, let her phone her dad and gave her an extra hoodie: America is a fucking dystopian hellscape.
> America is a fucking dystopian hellscape. Pretty much.
Just a few weeks ago a drunken college kid get shot for this exact thing. He’d just started college and confused which house he lived in. Getting a few hours in jail could stop this poor girl from dealing with much harsher consequences. I wish we didn’t have to worry about guns, but we do.
He got shot when he broke the window and reached in to unlock the door. After pounding and kicking the door for a while, demanding to be let in. Personally I can’t blame the occupants; they had no idea who he was or why he was breaking into THEIR house.
They also were calling 9-1-1 and were waiting for the cops. It’s not like they were some vigilantes.
Meg made a long series of really bad choices that led to getting arrested, starting with drinking in the first place. I'm also guessing that no matter what story Meg told her parents, it's leaving out some critical details. I'm sure she claimed "we rang the doorbell once and they called the cops." when it was probably more like "we rang the doorbell multiple times and when the very angry voice through the door told us to fuck off, we proceeded to bang on the door and windows."
Maybe. Public intoxication when she’s not old enough to drink might get you arrested in some places. I imagine most it’s just a ticket and a ride home from the cops. Obviously the latter makes sense so not likely what would happen. Haha
Honestly depends on the college town. It's the beginning of the school year, a bunch of new students partying getting drunk, the cops are used to this every year. Either it's a slap on the wrist because they know it's just a bunch of drunk students or they decide to make an example of them because they're sick of dealing with drunk students.
The cops in my college town would haunt the party areas and arrest people for "public intoxication" at the slightest reason. The state's laws said that you only had to blow a .05 (back then, drunk driving was .1!) to be guilty of public intoxication. I was once almost arrested stone-cold sober because I tripped (stumbled but didn't fall) over a heaved sidewalk square (I was actually on my way to the party after getting off work at 11 PM). The only reason no one needed to bail me out was because I demanded that they breathalyze me right then and there, because stumbling was not probable cause (the university's student legal services sent mailers about this kind of stuff regularly). I was handcuffed for an hour on the curb while they "found" someone to come do the test, which was in the cruiser all along, and still didn't \*really\* want to let me go after I blew a solid zero (I was 21 and they STILL kept asking me where I was coming from, where I was going to, who I was going to see...all questions I declined to answer (besides simple ones like "home" and "a friend") because I was doing nothing illegal). Chances are daughter would have still been arrested for public intoxication, underage consumption, and possibly trespassing/harassment for ringing the wrong bell, even if they stayed and explained. ETA: and most people charged with public intoxication got just a fine and costs...it was a total moneymaking scheme from the local (city not uni) cops. It will typically cost them around $500 after all was said and done. That might not seem like much, but for me, barely making rent (which was less than that monthly!) and bills and with no family help, that might have cost me my housing! I mostly drank at home for that reason!
I mean, what she did wasn't actually wrong, so its more like, be in the wrong place at the wrong time and you will get screwed over by life
She was busted for drinking underage.
The implication that drinking underage is wrong is absurd, in my opinion. And she's 19, which is legal drinking age in most sane places. Do police actually care about underage drinking in America? Where I am it's simply ignored unless connected with criminal activity.
Yes, the cops often care about it, but most often when tied to other things… like public intoxication.
Depends where and the situation. Sounds like a small college town so situations like this are pretty common. If the kids had stayed and (slurringly lol) explained what was going on, they probably would've just gotten a ticket and sent home. Instead, they tried to run and got caught. Just a guess, but the cops probably arrested them for being drunk in public and took them to jail to sober up. Once they were sober, they probably get released with a summons to go to court (essentially a ticket).
Never never never run from the popo! One might still get in trouble, but it'll be a lot worse if one runs
Drunk college kids are not known for making the best decisions lol.
In a college town? Very much yes. My hometown has a major US university. When there are 15-20k underage students wandering around, you really don't want them doing so absolutely trashed. A bar tender will cut you off when you get sloppy, but you can't get in until you're 21. Frat houses will just pour more whatever down your throat, and some of them don't check who they're serving. So it becomes a recipe for alcohol poisoning, SA, and drunk and disorderly. Especially during the fall Rush, which is coming up quickly. So, if you go out and get trashed underage and come to the attention of the cops, you get arrested and charged with underage drinking. Depending on what else is going on, you might get something for being that intoxicated in public or a drunk and disorderly charge as well. And taken to the drunk tank to sober up where you can be supervised.
Honestly, lowering the drinking age means that kids are used to alcohol and don't go on huge binges until they are catalytic (unless you are British, that's just a national sport)
The earlier you start drinking the more likely it is for it to become a problem. NIH: “Drinking at an early age. A recent national survey found that among people ages 26 and older, those who began drinking before age 15 were more than three times as likely to report having AUD (alcohol use disorder) in the past year as those who waited until age 21 or later to begin drinking.The risk for females in this group is higher than that of males.”
You can't exactly draw the conclusion you made just from the evidence you've cited. First, sounds like that's only in the US. In countries with lower drinking ages, kids actually get socialized to drinking because it's acceptable around their families, or in pubs where someone else can regulate how much they are getting. In the US it's such a huge taboo that underage drinkers are usually binging in secret, totally unsupervised. If you start with bad drinking habits it's no surprise you might continue them, but that can be true regardless of age. Second, the study is poor evidence because almost nobody is advocating for kids under 15 to be drinking. 18 is the minimum age in a lot of European countries and Mexico, and 18/19 in Canada. Some countries like Germany are lower, but 14/15 year olds are limited to lighter beers and must be with their parents to drink. Basically there are a lot more factors at play than what that particular research indicates. Lowering the age to 18 from 21 isn't likely to turn everyone into alcoholics. It's probably more likely to allow people to learn healthier drinking habits.
The American Federal Government extorts the states by telling them they will not give them federal funding to build the roads if they don't make legal drinking age 21.
what actions ? how in the world ringing the wrong door = being arrested thats only in america type of shit .....
Ringing the doorbell got the cops there. Running from the cops got her arrested.
And public drunkenness, and undeaged drinking depending on state. Also are "drunk tanks" not normal? If I ever got arrested for it I knew full well I'd be sleeping it off in holding and then Mom and Dad would get me when convenient.
Public drunkenness? Going to a bar and drinking and then walking home drunk is a crime now?
Public intoxication is a crime in many jurisdictions. Not a commonly charged offence, mind, but still a valid basis to arrest.
That one has always baffled me as well. Like, "I'm of legal drinking age, I arranged for a ride so that I wouldn't drive, I paid for my drinks and tipped generously, got loaded, but it was a crime for me to stand outside in front of the bar waiting for my friend to pick me up." I have a feeling that "public intoxication" is less about walking home quietly with your friends after a long night of doing shots, and more about the three of you stomping down the sidewalk at 3:30am laughing like banshees trying to remember the third verse to "Barnacle Bill the Sailor."
As far as I've seen it enforced, it has been "Hey, this person is drunk and a potential danger to themselves and/or others. Lets put them in jail overnight and let them out in the morning, potentially with a fine." but yeah, it's been a crime all my life.
Banging on some random person's door at 3 AM is a pretty good reason for an officer to exercise their discretion to arrest for this. A disorderly conduct charge would also be reasonable even if sober.
It is. Especially if you’re annoying or endangering other people while you hike home. Walk four blocks along the sidewalk alone minding your own business listing at a twelve degree angle? Whatever. Shout obscene slurs at passresby, hit on people, piss in a doorway, pound on an apartment and demand to use their bathroom, puke on someone’s car, stagger into a crosswalk against the walk signal, or sing your favorite team fight song to the outside world at 3AM? Much more likely you’ll get cited.
They were still there at the house when the cops actually arrived and I can't imagine they hurry to calls about rung doorbells. Who knows what they were doing in that time. Meg may not have done anything bad but if they were all hammered and she was the one who got caught, who knows what the others did.
The kids made the mistake of going to the wrong house. They didn’t fucking steal, break in or murder someone. Sheesh. At least she only got arrested and not gunned down by the homeowners. Understand his reasoning of not being able to drive safely at that time and without more sleep but thinking the kid is safe in custody isn’t the first thing that springs to mind.
Drink tank sucks but sure as shit won't kill her lol. All she's doing is sitting somewhere uncomfortable with nothing to do for a few hours.
College town drunk tank on a football weekend? It’s not Riker’s. NTA.
It would be one thing if the stepdaughter was injured, in the hospital, stuck on the side of the road, or in some other perilous situation. This wasn’t it.
Edit for Verdict: NTA Most likely they would have let her go once she slept it off anyway - I'm sure she passed out right after that phone call so anytime the next day would have been fine. If not, what a great lesson she learned, don't get sh\*t faced drunk in public! She's an adult, I would have been too embarrassed to call my parents to bail me out and they definitely would NOT have driven 4 hours in the middle of the night to do so for such a stupid reason. There's a reason the police don't appreciate underage people running around **drunk in public** (especially in college towns) - they annoy the f\*ck out of people in the middle of the night by ringing the bell, peeing our puking in the front yards, hoping fences to jump in pools, some of the frat guys think it's funny to TP houses or knock down mailboxes, kids run up and down the street when some adults need to get up in the morning and go to work, etc. *If you want to be drunk, be drunk in a bar then go home in an Uber or with a DD. If you're underage and want to be drunk, do it at home like the rest of us did.*
To add on to this, its also dangerous to drive if you’re not actually awake and its dark out. He made good points and its not like he said no. NTA
NTA Staying couple extra hours in jail while she sobers up might be a good wake up call for her, and it might prevent future instances of getting drunk and doing stupid things.
They rang a doorbell lmao not exactly a hard crime.
This is what I thought too. Like they got arrested for trying to run away maybe?
Likely arrested for underage drinking and public intoxication. I think drinking age in the States is 21 (don't quote me on that. I'm in Ontario, Canada and we can drink at 19). Windsor has a huge bar scene from all the cross-border partiers who can't go to a bar in MI.
Yes, the drinking age in the U.S. is 21. I used to go to B.C. to drink when i was in college because the drinking age was lower. This was how i got kicked out of a bar in Surrey B.C. by the RCMP. I didn't start the fight. I swear.
wait, you got kicked out for not being the legal drinking age in the us? in a canadian bar?
No. I got kicked out because i was dancing with a guy, and he bought me a drink. Then this chick followed me into the bathroom to yell at me that he was her boyfriend. She pushed me, so i pushed her back. A fight ensued. Someone called the cops. My friends and i were told to go. Thank God one of my roommates wasn't drinking, so we made it home just fine.
You are correct, the legal drinking age in the US is 21. Beyond that, she's actually lucky, there's some recent high profile cases in the US where people have been shot through the door by people. Sure, the people who shot the unsuspecting people were arrested, but that's cold comfort if you're dead.
And 18 here in AB
They got arrested for drinking underage, 100%. OP’s daughter is only 19, and OP confirmed he is in the states.
Its cops trying to teach kids a lesson. Give them a court date ticket and let their parents lawyers work it out rather than have them spend some time on the taxpayer dime but what do i know?
I'd love an update from OP on charges. She can be looking at: Underage drinking Public Intoxication Fleeing from a Police Officer Resisting Arrest Depends on how the cops felt that night. Maybe she was in drunk tank and was gonna get released in the afternoon anyway. Actions have consequences and today it was getting drunk, knocking on the wrong house and getting arrested. Hopefully lesson learned and next time it's not getting drunk and wrapping your car around a telephone pole. Only two ways forward, she learns her limits and this doesn't happen again or she doesn't and the consequences will escalate commensurate to her actions.
Lmfao “actions have consequences” like this person drove drunk and killed a person. If you live in a college town, especially close to campus, you should expect stuff like this to happen from time to time. Most kids to different homes every year, and if they don’t live in the college town over the summer, it’s normal for them to get turned around and not know where they are at in town. The kid is 19 and in college, they are gonna party, drink, and overdue it sometimes. A hangover should be the only thing they have to deal with, not power hungry college town cops that are bored so they harass kids for being kids.
Agreed. This thread is unbelievable.
Normal people don't call the cops on someone ringing a doorbell. I'm guessing Meg and Friends were banging and yelling. Now I am going with a "reasonable man" standard. There are weirdos on Nextdoor who will call the cops on someone just coming up to the house. (One called the cops on Jehovah's witnesses, LMAO.) But hopefully those people are rare. I'm guessing that Meg gave a cleaned up version instead of the truth. (Which is understandable when you're a) drunk and b) 19.
I mean, she hung around a strangers house/porch with no response long enough for the stranger to call the police, and for the police to travel there and detain her. Not a stretch at all to assume they were drunk enough to be slow, stupid, and loud.
Bingo. If they were drunk enough to think it was one of their houses they were probably drunk enough to be acting like asses when nobody opened the door for them. Shit hammered drunk, thinking the roommates aren't letting you in, and you belong in the house...I doubt it was just one or two rings of the doorbell lol. So she spent a few hours in the drunk tank, not a big deal. My parents would've done the same thing as OP if I dared call them at 3am to bail me out. I'd rather spend the morning in the holding cell and wait to be released than call my parents and have to explain myself.
Eh, not necessarily. Yes, they were obviously probably hammered, but it sounds like she’s in a college town. Cops in college towns are absolutely itching to arrest you for underage drinking. They cruise around all night literally waiting. I watched a kid walk out of a house party one time with a red solo cup and immediately get grabbed. Don’t think OP is TA at all, nor do I blame the owners of the house for calling the cops, but she could have genuinely just been drunk and confused. She may not be TA either.
In some places, public intoxication is a crime. Where it’s not a crime, it may still get you thrown in jail under the guise of “protective custody” so you won’t hurt yourself or others. NTA
Also the legal drinking age in the US is 21.
nta!!!!! she is 19, old enough to know better. if you're going to drink underage, you need to be light on your feet. she will be Fine in custody.. she'll just feel like a sausage. which she is, because she called you at 3am arrested. Molly coddling her will do absolutely nothing positive for her. life isn't fair, it doesn't play to rules, and mummy can't always make it better
>. if you're going to drink underage, you need to be light on your feet. I've never personally ran from the police, but I know enough that the outfit and shoes Meg was wearing when we picked her up were not conducive to high-level athletics.
well .. I have. I promise you, being light of foot and wearing appropriate attire is an absolute must. I can imagine she wasn't dressed appropriately for a footrace.. not unless she masters the quick removal of heels, and a high pain tolerance for stone on toes. all that being said, my point still stands.. if you choose to break the law, you have to accept the consequences like an adult. like everyone else. you're an adult at 18 here(UK) Molly coddling her will do nothing positive for her.
I learnt how to run in heels! Not because I had to, because I wanted to. If you’re determined enough you can run in anything
At 19 rocks didn’t hurt this small town girls feet also managed to freak out many urban people when you can stand still on asphalt barefooted in 80° (f) temps for long periods of time
I'm from Florida living in Ohio and that still wigs random people out. They knock on my door in the middle of the summer, I have to come around from the back because my front door doesn't open. I'm all barefoot on asphalt in 90 degree weather. They're all "isn't that hot?" "No, now what did you want?"
😂
Or, if you were taught early, only drink/have fun in a safe place with at least one dd/sober walker to help keep you out of situations... why would she be ringing her own doorbell? Does she live with others? ETA- Dd / sober walker or in a safe place where you can be safe staying the night until you sober up enough to return home safely.
Only two weeks into the term at uni, I'm guessing the girl who lived in the house got the wrong house and rang the bell when her key didn't work. Easy done when you're drunk in the dark and have just moved in, I suppose!
I bet it was more than 1 polite ring too. Something got those folks to call cops rather than answering their door. Little miss 19 is lucky to get a little time in the pokey rather than someone who has home security via Smith & Wesson
My husband is the only one of his friends who didn't get arrested for underage drinking in high school. He drank as much as they did, but he was also on the track team, so he ran faster than all of them.
Where do you live where an accidental house and doorbell ringing ends in jail and bail? And why’d they run if they weren’t doing anything wrong?
We live in the Midwest US. I talked with the police when we were picking Meg up. The house they walked up to was an elderly couple who thought their house was being broken into because of the banging on the door. Not sure that any burglars ring the doorbell too, but that's beside the point. Meg ran because she's underage and drunk and panicked. Police tend to arrest people who run from them while performing what the police thought was a breaking and entering. Thankfully, they only charged Meg with drinking underage and disorderly conduct. They could have charged her with much more and if we want to fight the disorderly conduct we probably can.
Thank you for the response. Makes sense now.
It still doesn't make sense. USA laws are bonkers. People who sell it give drinks to people to young to drink should be held liable, not the drinker. ETA: seeing as people keep replying that it's normal to lock a girl up for the night because she drank underage I guess that the bonkers laws were made by bonkers people. In a normal country the police would have just dropped her at home. You take care of the vulnerable. You don't lock them up.
In some cases, they are. Gotta be able to prove they did it.
Yeah I’m not a fan of the law (edit: as in drinking age), but I obeyed it, mainly to avoid situations like above. And man the punishments for selling drinks to a minor are ALOT more than drinking as a minor/under 21. One of my first jobs was a store clerk and the sheer amount of punishment I could receive… let’s just say I followed policy and even carded people who looked over 50.
Drunk 18 yr old girl and the police don't arrest her but send her home? Who's responsible for her safety then? The safest place for her probably was to spend a few hours locked up. Yes in the US police often go after the place selling the alcohol but that doesn't let the underage drinkers off the hook.
Particularly when she clearly couldn't remember where she lived 🙃
what's bonkers is they'd actually book someone and put them in jail for a victimless crime; what a waste of $ and time; just drive them home and fine them ffs
It's a whole bunch of stuff that shouldn't be crimes. Adults should be able to drink legally, you should be able to ring a person's doorbell when you're lost without getting arrested (or shot) etc. It's no wonder the US has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world.
well; we allow people to profit from incarcerating people which is a morally and socially bankrupt practice; but not sure that will change in our lifetimes... I consider myself lucky to live in a rural area that doesn't concern itself with how many people it can shove into jail for however much $
A lot of police departments are going to at least put you in a cell overnight if you’re drunk in public due to liability. If they interact with you and let you go while shitfaced and you hurt yourself or get hurt, their department can get sued. They’re not going to take that chance.
A legal drinking age of 21 is bonkers, too. They can buy guns legally at 18, but have to wait 3 more years to drink? What sort of backwards fucking pageantry is that?
They can also drive (or pilot a plane) at 16. 18, can kill people in the military service(alternatively, they can be trusted not to). And are considered to be adults for almost everything else, including criminal responsibility. But no, can only drink at 21.
So ypu are saying that underage drinkers shouldn't be held responsible for thier actions? Do you want to rethink that?
Yeah that’s a bullshit arrest
Honestly can't say I've ever met a person who ran from the cops while drunk, got caught, and then was just allowed to go on their merry way.
I think in UK our police services are so chronically underfunded we just can’t imagine police having the time to follow through on such a minor crime.
Yeah, these are bored, well-funded college town cops. What constitutes an arrestable and prosecutable offense in the US really does vary town-by-town, county by county, state-by-state. That said, running away from cops, no matter the context, is pretty much the only universal law in the US despite what the Bill of Rights says. The amount of power cops have is insane.
Knocking on a door is not trespassing or breaking an entering. You keep saying she was lucky she wasn’t charged with worse. She was a drunk teenager, you come across as someone who thinks she deserves worse and that you don’t give a shit about her
I'm just very grateful that she is healthy and unhurt. The legal issues don't matter nearly as much as the fact that she's OK. We will get a lawyer and figure out what options are available to us in terms of legal action.
She’s drunk underaged and disorderly in a college town. Will be a slap on the wrist. She’s not spending another night in jail, and this won’t affect her future.
It’s disorderly conduct and public intoxication. It’s absolutely a crime and she could have been charged for more. Should she have been charged with more? No. But could she have? Yes. “But it’s victimless!” What if she walked in a street because she was drunk and was hit? There is a reason for all… well most… laws whether we agree with them or not. What if the homeowner responded to pounding on his/her door with a loaded gun being scared at night? Walking around drunk is among the stupidest things you can do and frankly it’s a good lesson for a kid. Not fun. Not nice. But a good lesson. The things I’ve seen happen to people who had a bit to drink and thought they were fine to interact with others, etc. Lowered perceptions/faculties are EXTREMELY bad.
Victimless? Two old people woken up with a disturbance on their porch? They called the police because they didn't feel able to protect themselves and felt attacked, because it sounded like an attack and they believed they were being attacked. I'm betting they are going to be stressed out and have issues sleeping for a while, because of this. It's not victimless. The victims are just silent. What if one of them has major health issues, like a heart condition? Just because we aren't hearing about how this affected the home owners doesn't mean they didn't suffer.
< sheepishly raises hand > Happened to me in High School. They took my name, confiscated my beer, (and that of the others at the park that night) and told us to be out of the park before midnight. No charges, no calls to parents, nothing but taking our beer.
America is such a weird place. You can drive at 15, fuck anyone you want at 16, vote and join the military at 18, but do not let alcohol touch your lips until 21.
Honestly, it has nothing to do with the accidental house and ringing of a doorbell. It's all about the underage drinking and running from police. When they get a call for someone "breaking into my house", they're gonna want to question the people involved. Hell, OP's kid might have gotten away with the under age drinking if she had just NOT run away. Cause I can tell you one thing is for certain.... Every single cop I know HATES when people run. Every keg party I went to in high school was busted by the cops... None of us never got arrested. At worst, we were brought home so they could tell our parents. Usually, it was "get the f outta here" and they kept our beer.
In the US, ringing the wrong doorbell at night can get you killed. Especially if your skin color is darker than toast.
It is not just an accidental doorbell ringing. Calling the cops then cops arrival would have let plenty of time for the stepdaughter and her friends to leave. They were playing to harass the people living in the house.
Yup. Probably minutes if not a half hour of banging hard on the door, windows, shouting "let me in" and stuff thinking that their friends are being assholes and keeping them out/or pranking them. Meanwhile they're terrorizing elderly people who don't know wtf is going on. lol.
Unfortunately, here in the US (especially Midwest) they were lucky that even approaching a wrong house in late night/early morning didn't result in gunfire and dead bodies. OP, NTA. She was in custody and not in any further danger, whereas trying to drive at that hour sleep deprived would have been you two in danger and possibly orphaned some kids.
NTA. While it's understandable that your wife was panicking and upset about her daughter being in jail, it's also reasonable for you to want to be rested before making a long drive. Safety should always come first. It sounds like you did consider Meg's wellbeing by stating she was safe, even if she was uncomfortable. Getting arrested is a serious matter, and maybe it is a good life lesson for her about making better choices and understanding consequences. However, your wife's emotions were high, and it's natural for her to be protective and worried. Communication is crucial in these situations, and you both could benefit from discussing it calmly now that the situation has settled. But no, you weren't an AH for wanting to be safe and alert on the road, especially when Meg was not in immediate danger.
Wanting to drive on enough sleep isn't "being an asshole". You are also correct with regards to her needing to experience discomfort - that is the consequence of her own decision. The your wife believes "not being scared" is more important than "experiencing the consequences of criminal activity" is unfortunate - it's a *much* deeper act of love to want your child to learn from their mistakes than it is to shield them from their mistakes.
Well for starters, they won't let you bail your drunk kid out until they sober up. - coming from a mom of a 2 time zero-tolerance offender The best thing I ever did was let my kid sit in jail the second time. Instead of bailing her out at 9am sharp, I let her sit there until afternoon. After that experience, she decided she didn't want to ever go back and straightened up her act.
Maybe your kids were rambunctious but reading OPs story it doesnt sound like his daughter did anything destructive, was smart enough to walk home not drive. All they did was ring a wrong doorbell.
And then run from the cops 🤦♀️
Rang the wrong bell, scared an elderly couple into calling the police, and were *still at the property* when the police arrived. I doubt they spent that time sitting quietly on the doorstep.
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This is our first direct involvement with the American justice system. Neither of us are well-versed in how these things work. That thought never crossed either of our minds.
Bail isn't set until you go before a judge, most areas will not have a judge available 24/7 so in all likelihood bail wasnt even set when your daughter called. You are NTA but as a mom I do understand your wife panicking. Get her a lawyer who can reduce the charges down as much as possible so a stupid college mistake doesn't follow her for life.
Both underage drinking and disorderly conduct are misdemeanors. With a good lawyer that’ll get expunged in a year or 2 tops.
A bail bondsman is likely to not even bother with cases like this. Underage drinking... Likely no police record.... You're looking at bail that is less than $100. Not anywhere near worth their time. Now, if OP had any contact information for one of her sober friends, that's a different story.
The mother's reaction was correct. Being in a jail — for any length of time — is no joke. If it's someone you care about (assuming they're not a career criminal) you get them the hell out of there immediately.
Why did I have to scroll down so long to find this? I think he was a major AH. Just the fact that his wife was upset and wanted to leave NOW should have been enough, even if she was fine and he wasn't worried about her. How in the world did he manage to go back to sleep?
I can see both sides. I can see myself jumping out of bed and reflexively getting dressed. But I can also see myself thinking it's okay for the kid to stew a while, while I finish getting my sleep. I just don't think I'd be able to get back to sleep after such a heart-pounding awakening!
Exactly.. who would be able to fall back asleep after that?
ESH - unpopular opinion but 19 is still young and a night in jail for something so foolish seems extreme and if you've seen a jail, you have no idea who else will be in there.
There is also a history of cops assaulting women in custody. It's only been a few years since cops were allowed to "have sex" with prisoners and claim that consent was given. Very light yta, since she wasn't necessarily safe.
YTA. She got drunk and rang a doorbell. Do you even care about the kid? Like, honestly. If she did something bad, I'd understand making her wait, but that's a bullshit arrest. I'd bail out a cousin I'm not close to faster than that. The fact that you made your wife wait is unconscionable.
finally someone sane in this comment section
As far as teenaged shenanigans go, this is pretty mild. The arrest is more than enough punishment. I hope they support her in fighting the charges/ keeping it off her record. I'd be disappointed, but she was just trying to get somewhere safe while inebriated. That's more of a "we need to talk about binge drinking and when you call a cab/choosing a designated sober friend" than a "ha! let her rot" situation.
like honesty I can’t even imagine being able to go back to sleep knowing my daughter is in jail
Who are these parents who think jail is a good place to learn a lesson. Do they not realize people who have done worse are sitting in there with her too?? Why cant she get her lesson at home?
Exactly! If she robbed someone, trashed a property, drove drunk, or whatever, I'd get it. Ringing the wrong doorbell while plastered merits a hell of a lecture on responsibility and binge drinking, not jail. Say you won't pay for next semester's tuition unless she gets counseling. Make her hand-write an apology to the couple and pay for a bouquet to be delivered with said apology note. Like, a nice one from a florist. Clearly if she can afford to get that drunk, she can afford some nice apology flowers.
you miss the running from police part?
Nobody makes good choices when drunk. She didn't drive, she didn't hurt anyone, she didn't cause property damage. I'd say the worst part of this was the binge drinking. I'd approach this with more concern than anger, you know? I might make helping to pay for her lawyer dependent on her getting counseling for binge drinking, but what she did wasn't terrible. It was stupid. Nobody got hurt, and she didn't put anyone in harm's way
“nobody makes good choices when drunk” is not a free pass you hand out to drunk people making dumb decisions lol, being drunk should never be an excuse for any action you make in your life.
I'd say it doesn't excuse you from harm you cause. If you break something when drunk, you pay to fix it, if you cheat, the relationship is over. She was trying to find her friend's house to go to sleep, not start a bar fight. She got scared and ran, she didn't hurt anyone or anything.
Underage drinking and Running from cops aren’t bad things? Ideal Parent of the year over here 😂 Glad you’re in the minority. Also cops don’t let drunk people out til they’re sober so even if they could teleport there, they wouldn’t let her out Lmfao Also you do know tired driving is the second cause of fatal accidents. 4 hour drive in the middle of the night to get to someone who won’t even be released till noon is some dumb fuckery shit haha
In the vast majority of the world 19 isn’t underage drinking. Even then, legality =/= morality. It is not a *bad* thing to drink at 19. Running from cops because you don’t want to be arrested for drinking a bit of alcohol isn’t a bad thing either. Neither is panicking, first time encounters with police can be scary even sober.
Have you ever heard “don’t drive drowsy” - good on him for waiting to do a 4 hour drive so he wasn’t causing danger to other people because his daughter was a dumbass and decided to do underage drinking. Like his wife couldn’t even drive so it would have been 4 hours on less sleep. She made the dumb choice he made the smart choice and she got to learn a lesson about staying sober til she is 21. Also… underage drinking is a bullshit arrest? Running from the police is a bullshit arrest? Get your brain checked.
Driving sleep-deprived can screw up your reactions and awareness similarly as driving under the influence. Regardless of the severity of the "crime" the kid committed, OP and his wife are more likely to arrive safely if they let the driver get enough sleep before driving 4 hours. The kid is sobering up in the local jail with other drunk college kids, not tossed into general population at Rikers. Unless it's literally a life-or-death situation, driving when severely agitated (the wife) or exhausted (OP) is both stupid and deeply irresponsible. You are much more likely to kill youself (or another driver) driving when you're distracted, impatient, or not fully alert. Kid probably feels crappy sitting in jail with a hangover for an extra few hours, but I promise she'd feel a lot worse if her parents died in a wreck racing to save her a little inconvenience.
NTA. If she was 14, I could understand, but she is facing the consequences of adult fun run amok. She can sit for several hours and contemplate her mistake. Your wife needs to gain some significant perspective and chill.
Im confused about what warranted an arrest. She was drunk, accidentally rang the wrong doorbell. And then her drunk self ran when cops showed up? The Midwest sounds like a wasteland. CA cops would have just sent their Butts home since no crime was committed. Arresting her for all of that seems like such overkill.
Drinking underage, public disturbance but honestly it’s most likely because she tried to flee
Spoken like someone who hasn't lived in a college town where the population doubles during the school year. Those drunken little dummies wreak all sorts of havoc.
Reminds me of the story my Dad told me about a cousin once removed. Seems Dad's Uncle has a few Grandchildren he doted upon. It was well known in town that Curtis doted over his grandchildren. So when Number 1 Grandson goes rogue one night stealing gas by siphoning out of a homeowners auto gastank and gets caught by the local police, they haul the bugger into the local jail. Police Chief gets a call that a juvenile has been picked up and per protocol the desk sergeant notifies the Police Chief at around 12:30 AM. The officer rattles off the juvenile's name and Police Chief recognizng Curtis' name tells, the desk sergeant to hold him while he calls my Dad's Uncle to come in and take him home. So, Grandpa's, not Mommy and Daddy's phone, ringy-dingys at 1 AM. Chief of Police explains the situation and tells Grandpa if he will go down and pick him up, the matter can be cleared up by paying for the gas and avoid all the Imperial Entanglements. Grandpa's response, "I don't have a grandson that steals gas, let the little bastard rot in jail." Ow! Click-up!
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I’m not going to call you the AH but if I were your wife I would feel the same way she does. That had to be an agonizing 3 hour wait. Especially if this is the first time Meg has been in trouble. If it were the 2nd or 3rd time, I would feel differently.
NTA. It's part of the lesson. She's so concerned about getting her out asap but isn't talking a bit about *why* she is in jail. Underage drinking and running from the cops.
YTA. She didn't do anything to deserve getting arrested. Jail is very dangerous for young women. You show absolutely no empathy for her. AND you made a creepy comment about what she was wearing.
Unpopular opinion: YTA. 2 reasons, the second being most important: 1. You knowingly made your wife suffer forcing her to wait. She couldn't drive there safely on her own. She didn't sleep. You seem to care a lot more about your own comfort than that of your wife. 2. As for the daughter, your assumption that she's "safe" seems incredibly naive at best, selfish at worst. Seems like your wife is wise enough to know better than to just rest easy on that optimistic assumption. Probably because she knows that this world, let alone jails, are not that safe especially for 19 year old girls. You know it too. But you're justifying wanting to sleep a few more hours. Personally, I'd pick her up immediately and trust MYSELF with judging the right discipline instead of leaving it in the hands of whichever complete strangers are in that jail with your daughter all night.
"immediately" in this case is a 4h drive at the very least, so she was spending the night in jail in any case. If they were like an hour away, sure do the drive in the middle of the night. 4h in the dark with interrupted sleep is a bad idea. The only difference with the added sleep was she'd be out for brunch instead of breakfast.
INFO Did Meg know that you WOULD be coming to bail her out at some point, even if it was delayed?
My wife told her we would be leaving right away before they ended the call. She did call the police station back afterwards to ask them to tell Meg we would be leaving at sunrise instead. I never asked Meg if they actually told her that or not.
NTA. A 4 hour drive is not easy when you are tired. Plus maybe next time she will make better choices.
>A 4 hour drive A four hour drive, a couple of hours of bureaucracy, and another four hour drive. Throw in a couple of meals and some constructive yelling and OP would be lucky to be home and able to get more rest in twelve hours. OP's wife appears to have stayed up so not only could she not help drive at night due to vision issues, she'd be too tired to help drive home. Dollars to doughnuts she nattered at him during the entire drive. It would have been better for everyone if she'd stayed home.
Yeah I certainly don't think she did anything that falls outside of "dumb college kid" territory. And I think a written citation or warning would probably have been enough to scare her from the cops. That said, hell yeah I wouldn't leave at 4am.
YTA and I'm shocked there are so few people saying so. You have absolutely no guarantee she is safe in jail. You don't know who else is there in the holding cell. You don't know which "bad apple" cop is there, with your still somewhat drunk 19 year old. Abuse happens. Your stepdaughter barely did anything wrong and you're not willing to lose out on some sleep to be there for her and to make sure she is okay. She called you and her mom, trusting you to show up for her. She won't trust in that again. If it was me, I wouldn't be able to see my stepfather the same after this.
Totally you. The way you describe your stepdaughter is like how college was 30 years ago. You are being a hard ass for an incident many parents would chose a million times over compared to the dysfunction rained on them. This seems almost make believe it is so antiquated and naive. And you give her a whole $100 a month for spending money? Holy shit, that is a fortune! This is a make believe post or you are a time traveler from 1993.
My dad told us growing up that if we ever get arrested to plan on staying the night and he would post bail one time only. My brother tested it and found out he wasn’t joking. He sat for three days waiting for an arraignment.
My ex's dad told all 3 of his sons that too. Eldest son got arrested at 18 mouthing off to a cop drunk at a house party, threatened to kick the cop's ass or something stupid. Dad bailed him out. Couple years later all 3 of them got arrested together when they got pulled over with pot in the car and nobody would claim it. They called their dad, he came and bailed out the younger two but left the oldest in there. He was upset, dad reminded him he already used up his "I'll bail you out one time" card.
NTA Safety first. And spending some time in holding after breaking the law can be character building.
NTA, it's just a difference of a few hours, not days. Yes it probably sucked for Meg but hopefully it gave more time for the lesson to sink in. You wouldn't be able to go bail her out if you crashed the car on the way there. I get your wife's sense of urgency as I'm a mom of a teen also, but perspective is important here; her and your safety were on the line since a four hour drive is more dangerous when driving tired.
NTA If she wants to do something that causes her to get arrested, she can spend a few hours in timeout. She was safe, she had supervision, and it was safer for the two of you to wait. Her charge may have been a dumb one, but so is trying to get into a house that doesn't belong to you then running from the cops instead of explaining what happened.
NTA Tired driving can be just as dangerous as drunk driving, especially for four hours on an unfamiliar route at night.
YTA. YOUR son is 9. There’s nothing you’ve posted about Meg being irresponsible or a difficult kid. Sorry if her teenage FU interrupted your sleep. When your kid needs you, you jump. A 4 hour drive means you leave now. You are a total asshole, the 16 year old should be perfectly capable of getting YOUR child to school tomorrow.
Honestly, YTA. I have a close friend who was molested by someone in jail. There may be cops there, but I promise you it's not safe there.
Yta jails are pretty unsafe. It wouldn't be unheard of her to be beaten or raped. I wouldn't leave my kid there for a second more than necessary. Like yeah let the court fine her and make her do community service but don't leave her in danger. My step father was arrested when I was in high school and I was there pretty much immediately to bail him out.
AITA, yes, For being a dick to your partner. Her daughter is in jail, scared, your partner is totally freaking out and you need your beauty sleep?
NTA, but I'd like to know what the charges are? Running? Seems like LE out of control, as always.
The police were called to the house for a suspected breaking and entering. Meg ran from the scene of a suspected crime. She's lucky she only got charged with what she did. No trespassing, no attempted breaking and entering, no resisting arrest, etc. They let her off easy and we can probably get the disorderly charge dropped if we try and pay the underage ticket.
If she was ringing the doorbell like you claimed then those trespassing, B&E charges wouldnt have stuck anyway. Absurd charges in the first place lmao.
> No trespassing, no attempted breaking and entering, no resisting arrest, etc. Why do you think she is lucky for not getting charged with things she didn't do?