Woman's BIL shows screenshots to prove her husband cheated, husband claims they're 'fake.' UPDATE
"In the heat of an argument, my brother in law revealed my husbands infidelity, he sent me screenshots of their conversations as proof but my husband claims they’re faked."
Here's the story:
We had a party last night. My brother in law Chris attended. He’s ten years younger than my husband. Near the end of the party (About 2AM) I was in the kitchen cleaning up. He was out on the deck talking to Jennifer, a woman Chris graduated with who lives nearby, they had both been drinking.
The porch door was open, so even though I wasn’t eavesdropping, it was impossible not to hear what they were saying. Chris was flirting with her. He kept complimenting her, saying how beautiful and pretty she was, etc. I guess at one point she pulled up his Facebook and saw that he has a girlfriend. He said she was lovely.
Jennifer said “Thank you, it looks like your girlfriend is lovely as well.” Chris started saying how they were going through something right now, they weren’t technically together, it was an open relationship, everything he could think of. Jennifer was being really cool about it, she kept saying thank you and how she appreciated his compliments but she wasn’t interested.
He was getting kind of annoyed and at one point he said “I bet if I was my brother you’d have no issues with this.” Jennifer said “Your brother is actually loyal he wouldn’t cheat on his wife.” To which Chris replied, “My brother cheats on his wife all the time.”
Jennifer replied she doubted that was true, and Chris said that he slept with someone he worked with and that “he was planning to f&%k her as well” and that clearly his plan was working since Jennifer ‘idolizes’ my husband.
At this point Jennifer told him he was acting out of line and needed to go sober up and walked away. Chris came storming into the kitchen and saw I was there, he told me something along the lines of how “all of that sh$t he said was true’ and how my husband ‘never gets held accountable’, he then proceeded to go into the garage and have a huge screaming fight with my husband.
In the fight Chris said that he didn’t deserve anything he had and my husband had forced Chris to keep his secrets, my husband said that Chris was a liar who wanted to ruin my husband’s life since he was jealous that he’s better off in life than Chris is.
For relevant context here, Chris was struggling a lot a few years ago, while my husband and I were buying a house, having our first child, etc, and I know he harbors some resentment from that time.) It ended with my husband kicking Chris out. He immediately told me everything Chris said was a lie, that he was just trying to cause chaos.
But when I woke up this morning Chris had texted me about 20 pictures and videos that were screenshots and screen recordings of conversations between my husband and Chris.
They were talking about how he had gotten drunk and slept with a coworker years ago, conversations between the two of them about Jennifer that were overtly sexual and showed that he was clearly planning to at least try to hook up with her, there were photos included in these messages. My husband said they were all faked, and he said my BIL has been planning this for a while.
I know it’s easy to fake a screenshot of a conversation but there were screen recordings too, as in I could see the messenger app being opened and him clicking on the conversation and everything, the recent conversations match the recent conversations in my husbands phone
but my husband doesn’t have any of the incriminating messages my BIL does. Are screen recordings something you can fake? And any other advice on what I should do here is really appreciated.
For clarification; My husband is not claiming my BIL faked all of these screenshots last night. He’s saying this is something my BIL has been planning to do for a while.
He said he’s always harbored resentment for him (this is true-Chris is very resentful of my husband) so he says Chris could’ve done this at any time and just had them ready.
Here's what top commenters had to say:
mfruitfly said:
I understand why you are unsure, because a lot of this stuff can be faked now, and this is your marriage so you want to be careful. The best thing to do is to go directly to BIL and ask him for his phone. See the text messages for yourself, call the number they are attached to (or look at it) and you will be able to see if they are real or fake.
You can't fake text messages connected to a phone number, so that should be all you need to do, and I imagine BIL would be happy to confirm, and if he won't, well that's a point against him.
Your BIL was so angry it wouldn't surprise me he faked them, but he was also clearly frustrated and if people think your husband is the golden child (or if he feels that way) he could have finally snapped and really be telling the truth.
It is very hard, within 24 hours, to fake not just text messages but text messages dated a year ago, and to do a video recording. But, I'm no tech expert so who knows. It is worth talking to BIL and getting his phone in your hands to confirm.
chatterpoxx said:
Regardless of what is going on, I support you in finding the truth and making an informed descision before doing anything rash and blowing up a situation. I do the same thing, double check my research. When the evidence comes in though, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck. I found ducks despite continued vehement denial that it was a tiger even though I had pairs of duck shoes in my hand.
Charming-Ad-2381 said:
The only way I can think how to fake a screen recording is if he was sending those messages to someone else and changed the name in his phone to your husband's to make it look like he said them. But you then say that the previous messages match up to the ones your husband did send... I think BIL is telling the truth.
Well, after this original post, the woman posted this update:
"My BIL faked the messages—my husband did not cheat."
My husband and I both went over my BILs. My husband was remaining adamant that he’d never sent those messages or cheated on me. When we got to Chris’s house he was able to provide the screenshots and screen grabs but not the actual messages.
He claimed he deleted the messages after he got the SS for storage reasons on his phone. Even so my BIL insisted the SS were real and that my husband just deleted the messages off his phone. My husband and I went as far as to go online and check our itemized bill.
There are days where my BIL has screenshots where according to our phone bill, my husband never texted him that day, or even the days before or days following for that matter.
I don’t know why my BIL had these fabricated conversations, nor when he was planning to “reveal” them, or if he just made them to have just in case to use as blackmail or to threaten him. He used an app to create them. We didn’t get much out of him as far as reasoning.
We’re going to go very low contact with my brother in law for the time being. I thought his and my husbands relationship was getting better but it clearly isn’t.
For what it’s worth, the coworker that my husband apparently “slept with” was three days postpartum with her and her husbands third child when my BIL claims the affair happened.
additional info He’s been wanting to hook up with Jennifer and she has absolutely no interest in him. But he overheard Jennifer talking about what an amazing husband and father my husband is. So after she rejected him again that set him off.
Why my BIL is resentful of my husband: He resents my brother because of the way their parents treated them. My husband never got into any trouble, his parents treated him well. When we got married they gave us the down payment for our house, they paid off both of our college debts so we could have a “clean start”.
My BIL was more rambunctious as a child so he was always treated like a criminal and eventually began behaving the part. My in-laws never helped him financially when he needed it. My FIL is very tough on him.
Here's what top commenters had to say about this update:
bitternotbetter said:
jeez, the BIL must really hate his brother. and/or wants to bang his wife.
wizeowlintp said:
The resentment that the BIL has, to go so far as to plot something like this is just sad AF. Taking out the issues he has with their parents for their favoritism out on OP's husband instead of cutting off the parents. It's also interesting to see that OP thought to check the phone bill(s) against the text messages, that's not something you usually see with these types of posts.
666-take-the-piss said:
Many of the comments on the original post were telling her she was stupid and had her head in the sand to possibly believe that her husband was innocent. Glad she proved them wrong.
Sidewardz said:
Wow a stunning display of faith from the OOP. Props to the strength of their relationship. BIL ain't going to be at many family events going forward.
Anra7777 said:
Man. How many times do we get proof that there wasn’t any cheating? Not many. What a nice breath of fresh air!
LadyNorbert said:
Well, I’m glad for OOP that her husband turned out to be innocent, but I’m sorry that the BIL turned out to be a walking trashpile.
Spector567 said:
They are going to go very low contact with BIL? I’m pretty sure that they are justified in never talking with him again and blocking everything. He literally spent hours in advance and getting information in order to fabricate a story to ruin there marriage. We don’t even know if there were kids involved in this too. I wouldn’t care what BILs justification was.
SwanEmbarrassed9125 said:
Obv we don't know full backstory but for the in laws to give OP and husband down payment for a house and pay off their college debt while never helping the other kid financially when he needed it? Big oof