What can I do if my roommates poisoned me? What can I do if my roommates poisoned me by improperly using pesticide without asking if it was okay with me to use it or even warning me or telling me after the fact? The product says clearly it is not to be used in areas that occupied more than 4 hours a day, rooms with vents, or anything not sealed. I woke up very sick and with an intense headache. This is not something that I ever experience under normal conditions. I found an open package and rubber gloves outside of their rooms. I heard them talking about it the night when I was in the bathroom about to take a shower, but it made more sense the following morning. I heard our other roommate telling them that it came in the mail and didn't come with directions, so doing what "that guy" said should be fine. I took a picture of the package, and on the label it says at the top with large letters that it is only for sale to and use by professionals.
If you're concerned for your health, see a doctor and get a diagnosis. Ask your roommates to stop the behaviour. If you have suffered losses that you believe you should be compensated for, ask your roommates to compensate you. If they don't stop, or they won't compensate you, and you think it is worth the time, money, and attention, you could talk to a lawyer regarding a negligence lawsuit. You can also move out.
The EU has banned all pharmaceutical products containing hydroquinone in greater than 1% concentration due to concerns over increased risk of cancer and mercury poisoning with prolonged use. The US has banned all pharmaceutical products containing hydroquinone in greater than 4% concentration, and products over 2% require a prescription.
It's probably not unlawful to ask, but an answer cannot be required immediately. Per the Department of Labor, Susan has 60 days to elect COBRA coverage (the qualifying event here being the termination of Susan's employment): Your plan must give you at least 60 days to choose whether or not to elect COBRA coverage, beginning from the date the election notice is provided or the date you would otherwise lose coverage under your group health plan due to the qualifying event, whichever is later. It would be unlikely for an employer to discourage an employee from electing COBRA coverage due to costs to the employer, as you suggest: Susan is still employed and thus could be treated differently in her last two weeks depending on how she responds because the company is struggling financially and is looking for every opportunity to save money. Susan electing to use COBRA coverage is unlikely to cost the company money, because the employer is permitted to charge her the entire cost of the coverage, plus 2 percent to cover the cost of administering it (additional DoL source). As far as privacy goes, I don't think anything illegal has occurred here. The most prevalent law regarding privacy of health information, HIPAA, generally does not apply to employers. Susan could, of course, request a private discussion, and any response from Emily could not rise to the level of illegal harassment or create a hostile work environment.
You sound like a lot of my dispute resolution clients on their first visit You seem upset, maybe even angry and you feel that you are being victimised and harassed and that the person you are in dispute with is an amoral scumbag with no integrity. I sympathise with your feelings and understand that this sort of thing is stressful and causes emotional turmoil. However, how you feel has very little to do with what the objective facts are. This is what I read: You agreed to pay 1/3 of the bills, You have been happy to let your roommate handle this, You have trusted your roommate to do this honestly, You have been paying what she asked when she asked for it, Your circumstances changed, You did not advise your roommate that this would make it difficult for the existing arrangement to continue, She continued doing what she had always done, You stopped doing what you had always done, Your roommate has been left out of pocket and probably is under financial pressure herself, She kept asking for the money, You saw this as unnecessary harassment, You showed that you no longer trusted her integrity and judgement, She reacted the way most people do to being indirectly called a liar and a thief, Things spiralled out of control. Put your outrage on the shelf and feel sorry for yourself when it's not happening on my time (unless you are paying me, in which case I'm more than happy to listen to all your troubles at $420/hour + GST). Yes, she can take you to court. She will almost certainly prove that you owe her whatever you owe her for the utilities. I think it's extremely unlikely that she has been dishonest about this (although anything is possible). You may be able to make an arrangement to pay through the court which means that she will get a pittance per week from now until forever. This won't make things better. You have to deal with the fact that, right now, you share a home with someone where your relationship has broken down and you will have to continue to live with that person. At least until one of you can move out. Take a deep breath. Work out how you are going to make the relationship at least tolerable. I suggest you start by apologising.
You can request in advance that you get only a half-dose: there is certainly no law prohibiting making a request. They may refuse or they may agree. If they refuse, you can go elsewhere, but you cannot compel them to do what you ask for, given current law. You can also yell anything you want, or flail about however you want, at your peril. You could seriously hurt yourself by jumping around, and you would not be able to sue them for your stupid actions. Nor could you sue them for assault, since to get the ball rolling, you have to consent to getting the shot. Although consent can be withdrawn, there is the practical matter that you almost certainly cannot effectively communicate withdrawal of consent in the time needed to finish administering the job. If it took 5 minutes to administer the shot, you might be able to say &quot;I changed my mind&quot;, and they would be required to end the treatment, against medical advice.
Most states have a low barring the distribution of counterfeit drugs, which this would appear to violate. For example, the Colorado Imitation and Counterfeit Controlled Substances Act, codified at Sections 18-18-419 to 18-18-424, Colorado Revised Statutes, makes it a minor drug felony (class 4) to distribute an imitation controlled substance which is &quot;a substance that is not the controlled substance that it is purported to be but which, by appearance, including color, shape, size, and markings, by representations made, and by consideration of all relevant factors as set forth in section 18-18-421, would lead a reasonable person to believe that the substance is the controlled substance that it is purported to be.&quot; It already contains a placebo exception for medical professionals stating that it &quot;shall not apply to practitioners licensed, registered, or otherwise authorized under the laws of this state to possess, administer, dispense, or distribute a controlled substance, if the distribution, possession, dispensing, or administering of the imitation controlled substance is done in the lawful course of his professional practice.&quot; But there is an argument that the intended purposes of the use of the counterfeit rather than the real thing was to prevent a suicide, and that doing so had that effect, which might excuse the crime. The fact that B initiated the conversation by asking A and might have successfully obtained the drug if he asked someone else makes this defense particularly plausible. People who fail to commit suicide do not statistically just try again by another method, suicide is an impulsive action that if prevented is not nearly as likely to recur if someone fails to do so by one particular method. Colorado expressly allows the use of physical force to prevent a suicide. &quot;A person acting under a reasonable belief that another person is about to commit suicide or to inflict serious bodily injury upon himself may use reasonable and appropriate physical force upon that person to the extent that it is reasonably necessary to thwart the result.&quot; Section 18-1-703(1)(d), Colorado Revised Statutes. This isn't actually a use for physical force, but it informs the application of the &quot;choice of evils&quot; defense, codified at Section 18-1-702, Colorado Revised Statutes in Colorado, which provides (with nuances not reproduced here) that: conduct which would otherwise constitute an offense is justifiable and not criminal when it is necessary as an emergency measure to avoid an imminent public or private injury which is about to occur by reason of a situation occasioned or developed through no conduct of the actor, and which is of sufficient gravity that, according to ordinary standards of intelligence and morality, the desirability and urgency of avoiding the injury clearly outweigh the desirability of avoiding the injury sought to be prevented by the statute defining the offense in issue. It isn't obviously immoral either (for the same reasons), although one could make a case that the &quot;victim&quot; could bring the tort of outrageous conduct a.k.a. intentional infliction of emotional distress, against the person causing it, although again, the question would be what were the damages and was it justified. The tort remedy is a better fit as it is often used in cases of &quot;pranks&quot; calculated to cause extreme emotional distress as this one apparently was. The intent of the &quot;victim&quot; to commit suicide might also constitute &quot;unclean hands&quot; barring a tort recovery in this situation in tort law if asserted by person A.
Laws against such actions are not stated in terms of popular and fluid concepts like "computer virus", they are stated in terms of clear concepts like "unauthorized access". There are federal and state laws against this. This web site lists and links to all of the state laws on the matter. There is also a federal law: a detailed legal analysis by DOJ is given here. There are some limits to federal jurisdiction, for example "protected computers" include "computers used in or affecting interstate or foreign commerce or communication". The term "affecting interstate or foreign commerce or communication" is widely used in federal law, and can be used to prohibit growing feed for your own animals. Anything that you "send" clearly affects interstate commerce (the internet is internationally connected). 18 USC 1030(a) says Whoever ... (2) intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access, and thereby obtains...(C) information from any protected computer Essentially, a computer connected to the outside world is protected. The key here is "without authorization". If you authorize MS to report back stuff about your computer, that is not unauthorized. It may not be possible to use their product without giving such authorization, in which case you can use a different product that doesn't require that you grant authorization. There is also the possibility that some software producer has technically violates the law because they think that it's okay for them to access the computer as long as they do no harm. Typically, people are not aware that they have granted software publishers access to their computer. The concept of "harm" is pretty much irrelevant to computer-crime criminal law. It would be relevant, though, if a plaintiff were to sue someone for sniffing around their computer: then you'd have to show that you were damaged.
The landlady is trying it on. The purpose of a deposit is to protect the landlord from being left out of pocket by: damage to the property rent arrears Reasonable wear and tear does not constitute damage. It seems unlikely that the stiff tap is as a result of damage. The hob is not so clear cut: the landlady could argue that it was damaged, albeit by accident, and the cost of repair taken from your deposit. If she insists that the only remedy is to replace the hob, she should make an appropriate deduction to reflect the fact that it is several years old and will be replaced by one that is new (thereby gaining her some value). It would be reasonable for you to expect to see the written report from the gas inspector who has condemned the whole hob in that case. But I find it hard to believe that: the plastic knob cannot be replaced doing so would make the hob unsafe, if the knob can be removed for cleaning it's my understanding that if the hob is indeed broken, I only have to pay what it was worth at the moment before it was broken. Your liability is to return her to the position she would have been in had the damage not occurred. If that means replacing a removable plastic part instead of the whole hob, that would be a reasonable remedy.