'AITA for secretly recording my co-worker after she accused me of harassing her?' UPDATED

"AITA for recording my female coworker without her permission?"

Here's the original post:

I know the title sounds bad but hear me out I 28m have a female coworker 26f who likes to flirt with all of the men at work. My wife 24f knows about her and how I feel. Coworker stays away from me unless it’s work related because I shot her down a few times and told her (on Monday) if she didn’t knock it off I would report her to HR.

Well yesterday that coworker found my wife’s social media and messaged her telling her that I’m a “creep” and “won’t leave her alone” and that I “tried to pay her for sex”. I was honestly disgusted. I ignore her existence unless it’s work related and I couldn’t believe the blatant lies she was telling. So today I go into work and have my phone in my hand and recorded our conversation when I confronted her.

I didn’t show her face the camera was facing the floor so all that was shown was the shoes. After some back and forth she admitted she was mad that I threatened HR and hoped my wife would force me to quit my job so I wasn’t a “problem” anymore. So I took the recording and the messages to HR and she was fired immediately.

On the way out of the building she screamed at me that I was an a$$h@le and a few other choice words for recording her without her permission and that she’s suing me for it. Even a few coworkers said I was wrong for it and I should have just showed HR the messages and how she’s a single mom and I just cost her kids their livelihood. So AITA?

What do you think? Did he do anything wrong in this situation? This is what top commenters had to say:

zombiemiki said:

NTA. If the genders were reversed, everyone would be applauding you. Always have proof and never go off he said she said when possible.

Crankypenquin said:

Nta. I know there is a grey area here because in lots of places its illegal to record without consent. BUT she was out to get you and proved she was willing to say whatever to get you out and I’m glad you got recording of her saying so.

del901 said:

She cost her own kids her livelihood. As if hitting on you wasn't bad enough, but contacting your wife and potentially ending your marriage. That's a bridge too far. From your title, I was going to say something else, but definitely NTA.

IHateKoalas1 said:

NTA, she brought that upon herself, she behaved like shit and now she has to face the consequences. You did absolutely right, and you have nothing to be scared of about that recording lol

CrystalQueen3000 said:

NTA. No one should tolerate sexual harassment. You did nothing wrong and maybe now she’ll learn to not be a boundary pushing creep. She wouldn’t take no for answer and tried to destroy your marriage. She absolutely deserved to lose her job.

Verdict: NTA.

He later shared this update:

Edit to add- I appreciate all of your guys concern about me actually getting into legal trouble. According to Google Ohio (where I live in the US) is a one party consent state. I have sent out a few inquiries to lawyers just to be safe, to see if she does have a case if she were to try to go the legal route. I will keep everyone updated the more I find out and if she does try to actually sue me!

Edit 2 - Thank you guys so much for the kindness and support! I’m overwhelmed with everything and never thought this would blow up. However, someone shared my post into another group which is fine, it’s social media and I obviously can’t expect it to remain private if it’s on the internet. But a lot of people seem very concerned about my age gap with my wife,

not that I owe anyone any explanation but we met when my wife was 21, we got married after two months of dating because we hooked up and she wound up pregnant. I was in the military and stationed on the other side of the country and wanted an active involvement in my now daughters life, if that makes me a bad person so be it I guess.