No, you’re missing the point. Diogenes claimed that a reasonable amount of Ex-Lax would not fall within the reach of the poisoning statute. That’s false, as people have been prosecuted for adding Ex-Lax to others’ food, which they probably wouldn’t have if they had added mayonnaise. The specific issue of putting it in your own food with the intention that a thief eat it (which is no different, as long as the prosecutor can prove the intention - or at least that’s what anyone with legal experience here says) is irrelevant.
Not true. Chili peppers contain metabolites called capsaicinoids, and they absolutely can produce injury. Cecil did a column, in fact – not available on-line at present – on the physical harm that can come from eating too much capsaicin. Here is a study confirming that fact.
I don’t agree. In Virgina, the relevant statute says:
Under the Virginia statute I quote above, this action is clearly a crime. You have (1) adulterated (2) a food with (3) some other substance with (4) the intent to injure a person.
Now let’s look at the North Carolina statute:
It’s very clear to me that by placing your food in a commonly-reachable area, you are placing it “in a position of human accessibility” within the meaning of § 14‑401.11(a). But you complain that § 14‑401.11(b) prohibits only “noxious or deleterious substance[s]…” which excludes ordinary foodstuffs. Since wasabi is an ordinary food, you say, it’s not a violation of § 14‑401.11 to secrete it in food, even with the intent that it causes physical pain and discomfort to another person.
So the question becomes: in North Carolina, can wasabi be a “noxious or deleterious substance” within the meaning of the law?
I think it can. I’m no expert on North Carolina law, and there appear to be no North Carolina cases directly on point, but in State v. Phillips, 364 SE 2d 196, Ct. of App. (1988), coffee was the predicate substance for a conviction. And in Aycock v. Padgett, 516 SE 2d 907, Ct. of App. (1999), the court discusses an example of a violation of this statute described as:
However… as I read other states’ statutes, I find the phrase “noxious or deleterious substance” most often used in a non-food context, such as laws prohibiting dumpin substances in lakes, and pertaining to the treatment of sewage. So it may be that this is a term of art that was never intended to apply to food, as you suggest – the only problem is I can’t find any case construing that term in the context of North Carolina’s § 14‑401.11.
They aren’t prosecuted when the food is stolen.
Nobody is going to be prosecuted for putting wasabi in a communal fridge and having it stolen. It absolutely would not happen. You people live in la la land.
It probably wouldn’t. The injury is small, the victim unlikely to involve police in the first place, and the problems of proofs of intent and causation are dramatic.
But ask yourself this question: I put arsenic in my ice cream, label it “Do Not Touch - Property of Bricker,” and place it in a workplace fridge after several weeks complaining about my workplace food being stolen from that fridge. My coworker Fred take the ice cream, eats it, and dies shortly thereafter.
Would I be prosecuted? Almost certainly.
Now: what is it about the law under which I’m prosecuted for my arsenic crime that wouldn’t also apply to the Ex-Lax or wasabi overdose?
Nothing. The legal differences don’t exist.
The barrier to prosecution you’re speaking of is a practical one. A prosecution is legally possible, albeit highly unlikely, for the Ex-Lax attack.
Nobody is saying you WOULD CERTAINLY be prosecuted. We’re saying that it would be a criminal act, as well as an immoral act. Yes, you could probably get away with it. However, that does not therefore make the act less criminal or less immoral.
And if you put an ice cream container in a public place it is certainly “in a position of human accessibility” Just because it is your personal container, it does not mean that it is inaccessible, especially if it is in a common use area.
Finally, it has been shown clearly that an over the counter medication such as ex-lax, given in unregulated doses, can certainly cause physical harm.
Bottom line: You can’t lay a trap to cause harm to another person for retribution for acts against you that they may commit. You may not be prosecuted under the law for doing this; but it does not follow then that it’s OK to do.
Indeed, people have been prosecuted in this exact situation. I recall a lively lunchroom debate about the injustice of such prosecutions, in the early 1990s, prompted by a reference to such a case in the Globe & Mail’s “Social Studies” feature (basically a thematically arranged “Odd News” feature.) The editor had returned to a common (and easy to populate) theme, “The Seven Deadly Sins,” and referenced someone who lost their job and was criminally prosecuted after exacting revenge in this way, with laxative-laced lunch. One detail that I remember is that the victim’s claim of “mistaken lunch identity” was pooh-poohed (ha, ha) by the judge, but that the lunch theft only earned him an admonishment against such antisocial behavior.
You can be sure that this happens with a certain amount of regularity (ha, ha) and it is unreasonably burdensome to ask for cites for *specific *instances where the victim is a lunch thief, as there is nothing particularly newsworthy about a laxative dosing and it is sure to come before the courts more frequently than it is reported on. A legal Doper with LexisNexis access (of a sort that doesn’t charge pe-query) should be able to confirm this, but a reasonable person should be able to make their own conclusion by reading the applicable laws; the statutes are clearly worded in such a way as to make this sort of “passive” poisoning prosecutable.
It doesn’t matter if you think you *ought *to be able to drug your own lunch and put it in a common area without fear of consequence - it is still a really really bad idea.
Bricker, I tried to get the nested quoting to work, but gave up. But let me ask another question.
Say I bring a ham & cheese wrap to work for lunch every day. It gets stolen fairly frequently. So one day, I switch to bringing in a sardine & kimchee & sriracha sauce wrap. I actually eat sardines & kimchee & sriracha sauce. Short of unrolling the wrap, there’s no way to tell that it’s not a ham & cheese wrap. My intent is that the thief will get a mouthful of sardines & kimchee if they steal the sandwich, and hopefully be shocked and disgusted, but if they don’t, I’ll happily eat the sandwich for lunch (far downwind of my coworkers). Is this a crime under VA statutes, and if not, how does it differ from the wasabi case? I’ve done no more “adulterating” in this case. I hope that the thief is injured in the sense that they get a mouthful of some seriously spicy food instead of ham & cheese. Is it only my willingness to eat the food if it’s not stolen that makes this not a crime? What if I did eat the unstolen wasabi, just in smaller portions than I would have if it was guacamole?
I guess the point of my question is at what point does “I’m switching my lunch to something else that I like, but the thief won’t, in the hopes that if they steal it again they’ll be grossed out & desist” stop being a crime?
This thread has lost all its fun. I was hoping for more blue-dye-soaked brownies, and less legal arguing. 
Sure, if you change the hypothetical, you get a different answer, but that doesn’t change anything about the first hypothetical.
I’m having trouble with the definition of adulterated. If someone added wasabi to guacamole, sure, that’s adulteration, but if someone brings wasabi in an unlabeled Tupperware container that commonly contains guacamole how is that adulteration? I suppose you could say the vigilante caused the tortilla chips to be adulterated with wasabi, but counselor, isn’t that over reaching?
It would not remotely be either.
Then consider my idea that the ice cream is on a pressure plate attached to a rope that suspends an old-timey 10,000lb weight above whoever is standing in front of the fridge.
Thank you once again for your informative posts, which amount to:
“Is too!”
“Because I said so.”
“It just is.”
I realize this is just how you roll. Carry on.
I’m not the one alleging something is a crime. I still haven’t seen a single statute saying you’re not allowed to put hot sauce on your own food.
I haven’t seen a single statute that says I can’t pound my next-door neighbor Ed’s head with a ball-peen hammer.
Of course, I HAVE seen a statute that says that I can’t maliciously wound any person by any means.
See, that’s how laws work. You will not find a law that says, “You’re not allowed to put hot sauce on your own food.”
You will find a law that says that if you adulterate food with the intent to cause injury to anyone, you’ve committed a crime.
That means if you add hot sauce to your food with the intent of having someone else eat it and get injured, you’ve comitted a crime.
Thanks for moving the goalposts.
I have already stated my opinion that “adulterating” food with another food substance is a grey area, and I think in some cases it would be OK. muldoonthief’s example of a sardine & kimchee & sriracha sauce wrap, I’d be perfectly happy with, particularly if (as he said) you’re prepared to eat it yourself. Hot sauce? Fine, if it’s just “really freakin’ hot”. Not so much if it causes blistering.
Here’s a test: Would you be willing to eat the substance yourself? It it just gross or bothersome, or not tasty or would it cause effects that are debilitating?
No. That’s exactly what happened – you caused the chips to be adulterated with wasabi, when the victim thought he was getting guacamole.
If your intent in doing this was to injure the victim, then you’re guilty.
So by that logic, if I kept the chips locked in my desk, forcing the thief to obtain their own chips, it isn’t a crime? What if I just ate the guacamole with a spoon, and one day brought wasabi in the same container instead? What if the victim just used a spoon too?
I have found a Pennslyvania unemployment case that suggests the conduct is prosecutable.
Raymond Jastrzab was fired after he brought Ex-Lax brownies to work in an effort to catch the thief who was stealing his food. After his foreman got sick, Jastrzab was fired. He filed for unemployment and the company claimed he was fired for cause.
The Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court agreed with his employer and denied benefits: