aitah for considerinf leaving my son in the county jail hospital over the weekend instead of paying $9,500.00 in bail?

[u/ShowerElectrical9342]

My son hit a pregnant woman with his vehicle and broke his nose and has stitches on his lip.

He was arrested and is in the county jail hospital. He wouldn't tell me how badly injured the woman is, except that she might lose the baby.

He's a careless, distracted driver who has totalled 2 cars, which his bio dad immediately replaced with even better cars!

But now his bio dad is gone (heart attack) and I don't want to enable this dangerous driving problem.

I'm overwhelmed.

He has had accidents before, and has always been bailed out.

I'm trying to get a regular lawyer because now he says she might lose the baby and sue him.

He's 19.

But no one wants me to take the time to get a regular lawyer instead of this public defender who insists I must send the bail money NOW or my son will be in jail all weekend.

Honestly, I don't know. Maybe that would be good for him. Like a wakeup call.

He didn't mention alcohol, but why else would he he arrested for a car accident?

Help! I have to move fast!

AITAH for even thinking about letting him spend a weekend in jail?

[u/Drabby]

It's also a popular scam in real life. My husband's grandfather got a call that my husband had been arrested for drunk driving and sounded funny because he'd broken his nose. He needed $9000 that very day, and nobody else in the family must know, for he was so ashamed! Of course none of it was true. Granddad sent the money. UPS stopped the delivery because they had the address flagged as a scam.

[u/crazyeagles62 → u/Drabby]

My dad, was in his 60's at the time, got this same kind of call. Fortunately, my nephew and my son, his only grandsons, were with him when he received the call. He acted all shocked and concerned, got some info from them, hung up and called it in to local PD.

[u/IHaveNoEgrets → u/crazyeagles62]

Ha! My grandmother got that, too. Except at the time my brother WORKED at the police station, so she knew it had to be bull. She still called my dad with the details, and he sent it to the PD on her behalf.

[u/LopsidedPalace → u/IHaveNoEgrets]

One of my grandmother's got that. The only difference is she had three grandchildren, two boys and I, and knew not that none of us would be damned fools enough to pull that shit.

Her husband's father was, I am told, an abusive alcoholic. They weren't vocal about their views by any means but I'm pretty sure if we had managed to get involved in something like that they would have disowned us. Which, fair enough.