What would you do if a teenage cousin asked to borrow your leased car for a road trip with her friends? I’m guessing any responsible person would say no.

That’s what this woman did, and apparently, her cousin and her friends thought she deserved to have the car egged for it.

Is she in the wrong for pressing charges after seeing the damage? Would you do the same?

Check out the whole story.

AITA for pressing charges?

My cousin turned 18 recently. She’s in high school.

She doesn’t have a car, and during her birthday weekend, she thought her parents were going to buy her one.

They didn’t get her one and she was pretty upset. I should note that I’m not very close to my cousin or the rest of my extended family for that matter.

I only heard about this through the grapevine from my dad. Anyway.

My cousin texts me on the Friday before her birthday asking if she can take my car (I just leased a new Ford Escape) to the mall and then for an out-of-town road trip with her friends over the weekend.

I tell her no.

But she felt entitled to it.

She begs and pleads with me. I tell her no again. My car is for me to drive and for me only.

If she wants her own car, she can save up and buy one.

She calls me a ***** and says that I ruined her birthday and that she’s embarrassed because her friends think she got a car for her birthday and she doesn’t have one.

I don’t respond to her and think nothing of it.

The weekend comes and I sleep in very late on that Saturday, waking up at 1:00 pm (don’t judge lol).

Even though my car is parked in my driveway and my gate is closed, I come to realize that someone egged and TP’d my car. With many, many eggs and 5-6 rolls of TP.

There was real damage.

And since the weather was warm outside, the raw egg baked into my car, along with the dried-up toilet paper, destroying the paint.

Since I have security cameras around my house, I decided to go back and watch.

At around nine thirtyish that morning, I see my cousin and a bunch of her stupid friends vandalizing my car.

I’m surprised she didn’t smash the windows and poke holes in the tires too.

To save my post from the 3000 character limit, I obviously pressed charges and my cousin is in legal trouble.

Her and her parents are furious at me for pressing charges.

Everyone is trying to make her rethink her decision.

Her parents are telling me that she’s “just a kid” and that she’s been through a lot of ‘emotional stress’ for this past year and that I should take that into consideration.

They also said I should be ashamed of myself for pressing legal charges against my baby cousin, that I’m almost 30 and ‘don’t I remember what I was like at that age?’

(I do remember, and I wasn’t stupid enough to egg anyone’s car)

They said “can’t she work something out” with me, like doing chores around my house for money if I drop the charges… that she’s young, that she doesn’t need a felony on her record, etc and that it was just a prank.

Right after I pressed charges, my cousin was calling and texting me over and over, saying that this could’ve been avoided had I let her take my car.

AITA?

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this.

Exactly.

The very least she could do is pay.

Yikes.

Another reader chimes in.

This comment sums it up.

The earlier she learns that actions have consequences, the better.

Her parents are enabling her behavior… Probably her whole life.

If you liked that story, check out this post about an oblivious CEO who tells a web developer to “act his wage”… and it results in 30% of the workforce being laid off.