41, M, San Jose, CA

About 3 months ago, I loaned an old lawn mower of mine to my neighbor. It was an old Snapper riding lawn mower. He was supposed to have used it for one time, but it started raining while he was mowing and he stowed it in his shed to keep it from being rained on. 

About two months goes by and I hadn’t said anything about it, because we work different hours so he’s not home when I’m there and it’s just an old mower I had. Well, then his son and my daughter (they are 17 &amp; 16 respectfully) were caught (by him) having sex in his sons bedroom. They’ve been friends as long as we’ve been neighbors, which is about 10 years. This leads mike (my neighbor) coming to MY house and demanding that I reprimand my daughter for “being a whore in his house.”

I was astounded. First of all, his soon was taking place in the act as much as she was. She later admitted to me that she wasn’t forced and they had intercourse several times before. I would also like to add that Mike and I hadn’t ever had a cross word up until now, even though he’s a very religious person and sometimes I purposely ignored him when he would bust my balls about alcohol consumption or marijuana use.  

Anyways, I ended up threatening to call the cops if he didn’t leave and he eventually did. 

A few days go by and I think maybe things cooled off, so I message mike and ask him for my mower back. He responded and told me to fuck off, that he didn’t have my mower. It was a lie because it’s been in his shed all summer. 

Realizing I have no claim to the mower (no service records or proof of ownership) I made a plan to regain the mower myself. I would wait until mike went to work one day and break into his shed and get my mower back. 

I took some bolt cutters and cut the lock off of the shed (it was Chain locked.) 

I recorded the entire thing on my cell phone from start to finish to prove that I was just getting **my** property. He comes home on lunch during this and ends up calling the police on me.  I managed to get the mower back to my property but he caught me in the act. The police arrested me for criminal trespassing and breaking and entering. 

Am I the asshole here? Seriously, I just wanted my mower back since he couldn’t accept that his child was just as involved in my daughters act as he was. He also called my child a whore to my face. I was just going to let him have it until he acted like a complete jackass. 

I’ve contacted a lawyer and we have subpoenaed the mower manufacturer as I bought it brand new, and the plan is to now try and charge him with theft of my mower 