Bank employee terminated for fabricating stalking claims against married coworker. AITA?
"AITA for causing a woman who badmouthed me at work to get fired?"
I kinda already know what people's answer to this would be, but I'm just asking to make sure. A bit of a backstory. I'm 24M born and raised in this fairly small town, which is surrounded by towns smaller than ours. People from surrounding towns come over to get their degrees/diplomas from my local university and college, because theirs don't have good ones.
My town is big enough to be a hotspot to surrounding smaller towns, but it is still small enough that most people know each other. In fact, most families know each other generationally.
Now to my situation. I'm 24M and work as an advisor at our local bank branch. About 2 months ago, a 23F was hired as a clerk. She was from a surrounding town and had graduated from our local university a few months ago.
For the first month, everything went well, she joined our friend circle and there were no issues whatsoever. About a month later, one day while leaving from work she pulls me aside and asks me out on a date. I declined politely, reminding her that I was married.
Most of my coworkers and I have known each other since our highschool days, if not earlier. My wife was part of this same circle, and my wife and I have been together since we were 15.
This topic had come up before, and I always have my wedding band on, so I found it weird that she still chose to ask me and not any of the other guys who were single, but I brushed it off and thought that was the end of it.
That was a weekend, so on the next Monday when I come to work, halfway through my shift one of my other coworkers, 24F, tells all of us that the 23F told her that I pulled her aside and asked her out and wasn't taking no for an answer. She said I had started stalking her on Snapchat and Instagram.
Here's the thing. My coworkers knew I didn't even have Snapchat or Instagram, and they know how close my wife and I are, so they realized she was full of hot air. However, there were a couple of coworkers who weren't as close to me who may have believed her.
I told my coworkers not to do or say anything to her and I told them the truth about what had ACTUALLY happened. I told them to ignore what she was saying and just agree with whatever she said, because I did not intend to make this a big issue, and I told them she was just being childish and didn't know how to deal with rejection.
Around 2 weeks pass and my dad calls me one day and tells me he needs to speak to me. I go to my parents house and my dad tells me a friend of his, who is a client at the branch told him about how I stalked a girl and she was looking to quit this job for another and asked if the friend could help her by hiring her into his company.
After I told my dad about what actually happened, I decided that I had to stop her from badmouthing me and reported to HR the very next day. When I told HR that clients were getting involved, of course they took it serious and investigated.
The HR lady questioned me, my coworkers and the 23F scumbag as well. Obviously everybody backed me up, and the camera footage showed her stopping me, and not the other way around, so she was put under the hot seat with HR.
At first, apparently she was adamant I stalked her and she showed HR an Instagram account with my face on it. Here's the kicker, that photo was very conveniently the only photo of me on one of my other coworkers profile, which she followed on Instagram. She had made a fake account and texted herself to be believable.
She was fired by HR on the spot, for spreading rumours with malicious intent and for disrupting the work environment. She was on her probationary period, so no severance or any pay.
Since I live in a town where people know each other, the news has been spreading quiet quick. Her job prospects here are null and void at this point. This is the only reason I'm questioning whether what I did was right. On the one hand, I'm happy as ever that I got my revenge, but on the other hand I don't know if I took it too far and should've just confronted her first.
Thank you everyone! As I mentioned in the first line of this post, I had a feeling I knew the answer, and all the comments have reiterated the same, so I'm at peace now. As a lot of comments suggested, if not her, at some point HR would've heard about this and potentially punished me.
Thank you all for helping me clear my conscience! I also agree, I should've gone to HR as soon as my coworkers told me the first time. I just gave her the benefit of the doubt. Lesson learnt. This was the first time I've dealt with something like this, which is why I needed the advice/clarification.
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:
She decided to FAFO and deserved to be fired. NTA.
NTA!! She actively tried to ruin your life, and caused a huge hubbub in your workplace. You tried to ignore her, but she kept pushing. She’s a psychopath, and appropriate workplace consequences were meted out. FAFO.
Yes, this right here! Exactly what I was about to post, but now I don't have to. But i will add, the worst part is she kept taking it one step further each time she spread damaging info about you and each time you said nothing.
Then she'd say or do something else, and then she actually built a fake profile of you to back up her falsehoods. Just in case what monster! Psycho! That's some next level cray cray. I shudder to think just how far this trick was going to take it. Good luck and take care.
This is not revenge. This was you taking lies out of her mouth and gaining control back of your reputation. She did this to herself.
NTA. Why are you even questioning this. She did it to herself. If not you, her next victim would have done what you did. You have all the rights to save your marriage, your reputation and your job if you are not at fault. Do not second guess yourself.
NTA. She ruined her own name by lying. Curious what her reputation is in the town, she's from. Good thing you didn't confront her because there would have been more and bigger lies about you.
NTA. Frankly, she was slandering you, and by having texts from the fake you, she was also libelling you. Both with malicious intent of payback. Had she been believed, you very well could have lost your job.
She could have won a settlement from your employer, and you could have faced probation/restraining order, or even jail time, not to mention the loss of your reputation. Never give someone the opportunity to get away with that kind of thing.