Man breaks into neighbor's apartment to turn off stereo he left on while away. 'AITA?' UPDATE
"AITA for breaking in to a neighbors apartment to turn off his stereo that he left on repeat, ostensibly for an entire weekend he was gone?"
Here's the story:
I need to provide some quick background. I live in a pretty sh*tty triplex to save some money. I can hear almost everything that my neighbors on both sides can do. One side is a lawyer who has the apartment as one of his outreach offices so he's cool (though I've heard some crazy things about the mindset of petty criminals).
Other side is this dude Warren who was cool at first but we had a falling out a few weeks ago because he's sort of a douche and I stopped inviting him over.
Warren started blasting his music as a way to get revenge on me. Both me and the lawyer have called the cops, called the building owner and Warren always gets a warning then chills for the rest of the day but almost always starts up again about noon the next day.
Last night, I hear Warren's music kick on about 8 but then I heard him leave. After "Then I got high" played for the 10th time I knew he was [screwing] with me. I texted him and asked him when he was coming back. He said "oh shit sorry man, not coming back until Tuesday. So sorry."
I called the owner, she said there was nothing she could do, I called the cops and they came over and said there wasn't anything they could do without a warrant. She said she would talk to her supervisor about getting a warrant but I never heard back from her. I tried to drown out the music with my headphones but couldn't take it anymore.
So at like 2AM I hoped over his fence and pulled up his sliding glass door (you can jimmy the non-sliding side on all three units) and went in his apartment and non only turned his sh*t off, I cut the cord to his 2003 circa ipod clock radio that he using to repeat the song. I then wiped off all my fingerprints as best I could and went home and slept soundly.
No fallout yet, but I feel a little guilty and I certainly shouldn't have cut the cord to his ipod player. But am I an a**hole?
Here's what top commenters had to say:
Suicune95 said:
I mean... dick move sure, but hey at least it won’t happen again. I’m just going to add that playing loud music non stop on repeat is a literal torture tactic, so I definitely don’t blame OP for that one. OP is a veeeery small a**hole in comparison.
mujahared said:
ESH, but you're also probably going to face legal consequences. Come on dude, you're going to get caught and likely charged with breaking and entering since you cut the cord. I hope he has a pet or something that he can blame it on. Even then, cutting the cord makes it obvious who it was and what their intentions were. What were you thinking?
muddledandbefuddled said:
ESH- specifically because you cut the cord, instead of just turning it off.
KimboJones1 said:
NTA. Yes it was against the law but imo it was the right thing to do for you. He was deliberately fucking with you and you tried the legal options first. I also approve of the chord-cutting to teach him a lesson. If he can't prove it was you even if he suspects you: good job. But this might as well end up in a serious neighborhood war. But you didn't start it.
Anti-Anti-Paladin said:
ESH. Also, you realize by cutting the cord you just left evidence of breaking and entering as well as POSTING ABOUT IT ON THE INTERNET YOU DINGUS.
ImCrius said:
Make sure that you fix your sliding door so that he doesn't have access to your place for revenge.
And Fire_Eternity said:
NTA. I don't think you should have cut the cord, but I also can't stand loud music, so I'd have gone over and shut it off too.
The man later posted this UPDATE:
I started to feel bad about cutting the cord so I waited until the lawyers secretary left and grabbed my old cord box and jumped the wall and into the door. I found a cord that was pretty close and plugged it in. However I didn’t check the polarization and it fried the clock radio. I just left it and I’m sure stupid Warren will think he fried his radio by leaving it on.