Your Dogs Destroyed My Home! Woman Sues Her Dad for Damages He Refused to Shoulder
Some dog owners are irresponsible, and to this woman, it’s been shocking, because one of them is her own dad, who seems to have aged without wisdom and empathy.
Once you’ve read this woman’s post, you’d liken her dad to an irresponsible teenager. But it’s more terrible because this kind of attitude is inexcusable for people of his age. And the thing is, her dad has no excuse since he’s not afflicted with any mental disorder to distort his decision-making. This is an older man who behaves like a spoiled brat!
He ended up being sued by his own daughter!
Here is this woman’s story, shared with Reddit’s popular r/AmItheA–hole community under the username u/Willing_Specific_198: “My (F31) mom passed away last year. My dad (56) married a woman (37) with a son (16) about six months later. I think that the age difference is a bit much, but she is nearly 40 so it’s not like he’s robbing the cradle.”
OP continued to relate that whenever her parents went away, she would always take care of their dogs. They were not the dogs of her childhood, but they were well-behaved puppies. And always, her mom would phone her to let her know in advance about trips they were going to take. Then, OP would make sure that either she or her boyfriend was at home when the puppies were dropped off.
But OP also said that she and her boyfriend don’t keep pets because her work involves travels, while her boyfriend goes out of town for a couple of weeks and then gets two weeks off.
OP described how the trouble started: “Well, my dad and his new wife decided to go on a trip. But since it was never his responsibility, he didn’t call. I was out of town. My boyfriend was working. My dad has a key to my house for emergencies and to drop off the dogs. My neighbor called me a day later about the dogs howling in my house to see if everything was okay. I called my dad, and he told me that he didn’t know I was out of town. I said that if he didn’t come to get them, I was calling animal control. So he had his new stepson come to my house to get the dogs. I have no idea why a 16-year-old kid who was trusted to stay home by himself could not just have watched the dogs in the first place. When I got home, I found a disaster area. Dog crap and piss everywhere.”
Naturally, OP was furious. She had to clean up everything and get a replacement for her boyfriend’s leather recliner, which cost around $7,000. She then talked to her dad, telling him that he must pay for everything that his dogs destroyed at her home. Her dad answered that he would check if his home insurance could cover the damage.
However, when her dad was able to confirm that the damage to her daughter’s house was deductible, he also voiced out his concern that it would be a lot and that his premium would go up. Still, he made a promise to OP that he would take care of the matter.
What happened next? OP wrote, “It’s been a few months, and I am sick of waiting. The limit for small claims court in my state is more than double what I want. So I am suing him. He was served and called me to complain. He doesn’t have the money because he just bought a new car. He bought the car after my house got destroyed. I feel no pity. But he and his wife keep trying to talk me out of pursuing this. They said that my dad paid for a good chunk of my student debt and that I owe him.”
OP said it’s true that her parents had paid about $10,000 of her student debt, for which she’s very grateful. It was one of the reasons that she had been dog-sitting for them without any cost to her parents.
Now, her dad’s claiming that if she takes the money for the damage at her home that was caused by his dogs, he would have nothing left. This statement is untrue since he’s not retired and OP’s mom had life insurance from which her dad benefits.
It’s no real wonder that this older man got lambasted by Reddit’s AITA community and his daughter was praised for her action to seek justice and teach her dad a moral lesson.
