Now Jane Clark is suing the building management of 1211 Avenue of the Americas, where Fox and the Post are housed, as well as two building maintenance companies, over the bites she incurred, says CBS News.

The New York Observer reports that the lawyer for the plaintiff, a Mr. Schnurman, is blaming “Foreigners” for coming to hotels here and bringing bed bugs with them:

“My position is that it comes from foreigners,” Mr. Schnurman told The Observer. “Because it became so inexpensive for foreigners to travel here, I believe they brought it into our hotel system.”

I don’t think we’ve seen evidence that this is the way bed bugs got here. And there is plenty of evidence they were here before in lower numbers. Many factors are cited for their resurgence including overseas travel (which, as I am sure Mr. Schnurman has noticed, happens in both directions–and you can bet your patootie that people in other countries are claiming New Yorkers and Vancouverites and Cincinnatians are bringing bed bugs to their hotels too, as they surely are), and changes in pesticide use (including the move from monthly baseboard spraying towards targeted roach gels and treatment when needed. Pesticide resistance and chicken farms may also be relevant factors.

While there may have been some bed bugs in every country all these years (as in the US), they do seem to be spreading at a hasty pace worldwide. There isn’t some magical place where it all began, bed bug ground zero has not been identified, and appears to be a myth.

Anyway, I am not sure it’s at all relevant to the case where bed bugs came from, since the issue seems to be whether the building management and maintenance were responsible for the woman’s hardship and distress — which includes Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. (There don’t seem to be any hotel-billeted foreigners involved in this case, from what I can gather.)

Bed bugs moved with employees when their department moved to another part of the building, and the story is that Clark received bed bug bites on three separate occasions, raising the question of how many times she was actually bitten: three times, or during three periods?

I wondered also why the Observer felt it had to note that,

For the record, Ms. Clark had no history of mental illness prior to the bedbug attacks.

If she had, any distress she may have suffered could have been just as significant.

Interesting tidbit offered by the Observer: Alan Schnurman, assuming that’s the Mister in question,

. . . has handled “hundreds” of bedbug cases, most of which have been settled out of court.

You can read about some of them here.

New York vs. Bed Bugs has more links and additional prescient analysis.

• Hotel Pennsylvania Settles Bedbug Suits for Nearly $100,000 | The New York Observer
• Thai trains play the bed bug blame game: blame backpackers for bed bug infestation
• Bed bugs lurk in hotel rooms, says ABC news
• Travel reporter gets bed bugs after hundreds of hotel stays

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Then, a year later, in November 2007, someone else claimed there were bed bugs in the Fox newsroom. This second rumor was circulated by mediabistro blogger TVNewser.

Now a Fox executive has told the New York Times that they just recently discovered they had bed bugs in their newsroom, that they have been treated and are gone:

In an interview on Monday, Warren Vandeveer, senior vice president for operations and engineering at Fox News, said the cable channel had realized it had a problem a few weeks ago, when an employee “caught a bug and showed it to us.” An exterminator determined that the incursion was limited to a “very small area in the newsroom.”

The NYTimes claims Vanderveer told them that the problem was discovered “a few weeks ago,” the exterminator’s treatment ended “about a week ago,” and the bed bugs are now “totally eradicated.” If that timeline of detection and treatment is accurate, many experts might say it is too soon to say for sure that the problem is “totally eradicated.”

As for how long ago Fox has had a bed bug problem, is it true that bed bugs only first appeared in the Fox newsroom “a few weeks ago”? Or were they only first verified then?  Were they also there in November 2007 as per TVNewer’s tip? (TVNewser claimed the newsroom was getting pest control treatment last November.) Did TVNewser get faulty information? And were any bed bugs in Fox News in November 2006 as Claudia’s source claimed?

If the 2006 and/or 2007 rumors of bed bugs at Fox were incorrect, it’s a pretty big coincidence that the only station that we’ve heard rumored to be infested with bed bugs — twice — later became infested with bed bugs.

Vanderveer also apparently told the New York Times that

. . . the source of the bugs was not determined until the exterminator inspected the homes of about 20 employees. Mr. Vandeveer said the exterminator later described one employee’s home as having “the worst infestation he had seen in 25 years in the business.”

This raised all kinds of questions in my mind, but foremost in my mind is this one: did Fox insist all newsroom employees had their homes searched, or did they volunteer?

Finding that one employee has a serious, serious bed bug infestation may seem like a smoking gun to Fox, but it actually doesn’t in itself prove the employee brought them in to work (rather than someone else doing so).  I grant that it is highly likely.

But still: what if the home where bed bugs was found was not the worst case PCOs had found in 25 years? In that hypothetical case, would it be fair to link bed bugs to an employee whose home was found to have them? What kind of evidence is needed to verify such a connection? Even if every company employee’s home was searched, which does not seem to be the case here, could such a connection be proven?

Gawker claims to have gotten a tip alleging that the person who brought the bed bugs in was subsequently fired. (Gothamist asks, “Is that even legal?”)

This is the second time we’ve heard an employee was allegedly fired for bringing bed bugs to work. The first we heard of was at Cadwalader.

I am very glad for those who work at Fox that the bed bug infestation was detected and treated. I hope that the treatment which began only a few weeks ago continues until everyone really is certain.

• Another top NYC lawfirm gets bed bugs
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• Richard Fagerlund knows how to kill bed bugs in one visit

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Now the Thai railway company is blaming backpackers for bringing bed bugs to the trains, as the Bangkok Post reports in an article entitled, “Foreign Backpackers deny they’re bed bug spreaders.”

Foreign backpackers say they are disgusted by bed bugs, but even more disgusted by the suggestion they are the ones carrying the insects onto trains. Many foreign backpackers waiting for trains at Hua Lampong station yesterday conceded they knew little about bed bug infestations on trains.

They said the thought of bed bugs crawling on the velvety seats of long-haul trains and biting passengers while they dozed off was truly off-putting.

But to be accused of carrying the blood-sucking bugs on to trains was even more disgusting, said many foreign backpackers interviewed yesterday by the Bangkok Post at the train terminal.

Bed bugs can travel in any direction. Anyone could have brought the initial bed bug(s) onto the train: employees, local travelers, foreign backpackers, even train inspectors.

But the comments being made by officials in Thailand imply they haven’t got a clue how bed bugs behave:

Transport Minister Santi Prompat said yesterday the bugs may have jumped onto travellers’ backpacks during forest treks and then found new homes in the cosy seats of the trains. He said the velvet-covered seats and cool temperatures contributed to make the trains a fertile breeding ground for the insects.

Bed bugs would enjoy a nice velvet-covered seat, but they can also live in the train structure itself. And while bat or bird bugs are similar to bed bugs and might be found in the forest, they don’t leap onto people as they walk by.

Backpackers could certainly have brought bed bugs from a hotel or other lodging, as this traveler concedes:

American Sean Vaughan-Housman, 23, said he had not heard the news about the train beg bugs, but added he had come across the insects at a guesthouse.

But it may be unfair to point the finger at backpackers for the infestation of bugs on the trains, he said.

It most certainly is: you can’t prove foreign backpackers brought bed bugs onto the trains, or were the only people to do so.

More important, however, is the fact that travelers who rode on the infested trains are likely to have caused other infestations when they left it.   Maybe a few people brought bed bugs on to the trains, and yet how many more surely took them away from it?  The train infestation likely caused other infestations of passenger homes, guest houses, restaurants, even other trains, buses or planes.

If anyone sat on the train and picked up a hitchhiking bed bug in their clothing or bags, they could have infested subsequent locations. So the train company should be focused on that scenario. They’re to blame for infesting others as well.

This is why the bed bug blame game does not work: when people jump to blame others, they often forget there’s usually many more who can rush to blame them.

Sawittee Malaipan, an entomologist at Kasetsart University, said some foreigners, including refugees and tourists, did not like to take baths and so they attracted the insects.

It’s not surprising to see this sort of rhetoric levied against western young people. Here in the US, many want to blame immigrants for spreading bed bugs. But this entomologist’s line of thinking is incorrect: bed bugs are not attracted to people who do not take baths.

My assessment of this piece is that bed bugs are as much of a surprise to locals in Thailand as those in Paris or New York City. Once one realizes, “they’re back,” there’s a rush to place blame.

Well, sorry: they’re just back. Everywhere. Trying to blame others when bed bugs appear is pointless and distracting. It’s also usually based on faulty logic and scant or no evidence.

Instead, look to yourself. Do your best to keep your home, business, bed-and-breakfast lodging or public transport system bed bug-free, and you will keep from spreading bed bugs to others. And when you do get bed bugs, catch them quickly, apologize to anyone affected, and for goodness’ sake, get rid of them ASAP.

Thanks to hopelessnomo for pointing this article out.

• Bed bugs infest Thai trains, Bangkok Post reports
• Bed bugs infest New Rochelle cell block and three police cars
• Bed bugs in French SNCF trains
• Fox employee suing building management, maintenance over bed bug bites

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Edward Higgins, the defense lawyer, tried to kill the suit, claiming it’s impossible to know how and when bed bugs arrived in the home, but the judge did not dismiss the civil suit:

Circuit Judge John McBain said there’s no evidence the YMCA camp knew of the blood-sucking insects in 2005, but a jury or judge could decide whether officials should have suspected bugs and used routine pest control.

Higgins’ response?

“No one in the Midwest had a clue there were bedbugs here,” Higgins said. “Most people thought it was the subject of a nursery rhyme.”

The bed bug blame game is a difficult one to win, as Higgins knows. In most cases, we have to admit a lack of definitive evidence as to the source of an infestation.

On the other hand, whatever the climate in 2005, the days of denying responsibility because you never heard of bed bugs in your area are now kaput.

Nevertheless, detecting bed bugs is no picnic even when you are aware, as many Bedbuggers will attest.

And it is true that you have to be aware in order to detect them. Still, the article asserts that

While bedbug population has been on the rise in the United States in the last five years, it is not true that no one in the Midwest knew of their existence before that.

“Bedbugs and people have been together since we lived in caves,” Michigan State University entomologist Howard Russell said.

Bed bugs have been here all along: we keep hearing this. Many entomologists and PCOs will assert they saw bed bugs (albeit more rarely) throughout the golden years of 1972-1999 (after DDT was banned in the US but before the current epidemic “began”). And yet others date the resurgence of bed bugs to circa 1999.

On the other hand, Russell does not see a clear link in the YMCA infestation and the home infestation:

“I would argue it was a coincidence because bedbug populations are on the rise, and there are many sources,” Russell said. Also, only DNA testing could prove the bugs hitched a ride from Storer Camp to the plaintiff’s house, he said.

Now, about that DNA testing: does he mean testing the home bed bug’s DNA (against that of the bed bugs found at the camp?) Or does he mean testing the client’s DNA being compared with that found in blood eaten by bed bugs at camp? Even if it’s proven that the bed bugs at camp and the bed bugs at home are from the same strain, or bit the same boy, how would either test prove definitively that bed bugs did not travel in the other direction?

Yes, I know a lot of readers will be really frustrated with me. Of course he got bed bugs from the camp, people will say. The same way that when someone first notices bed bug bites after a trip to a hotel, or the purchase of a new mattress (delivered in a truck), they will assume they know the source of bed bugs. And make no mistake, these are all probable sources. But it is also true in these cases that bed bugs could have been present in the home–undetected–before the incident in question.

That’s why the blame game doesn’t usually work.

I’m not a lawyer, but it seems like more than probability is needed to win a lawsuit.*  Perhaps that kind of evidence is available to the judge and jury.

Not enough information is available from the article to call this a coincidence, nor to place blame. We don’t know what the kid saw or experienced at camp vs. at home. We don’t know if he was bitten at home first, or at camp. And even if we did, this moment (the first bite) is often hard or impossible to identify: it appears you can be bitten for months without reacting. People sometimes report a large number of bites appearing at once after many bites not causing an immediate reaction; entomologists who feed bed bugs have reported this occurrence.

Because bed bug bites are allergic reactions, and vary so widely, it is very hard to say when the cause is introduced, or removed.

*Update (3/10/2008):  a reader who happens to be a lawyer responded to my comment above that, “I’m not a lawyer, but it seems like more than probability is needed to win a lawsuit.”

Actually, the standard for a civil case is
“preponderance of the evidence” — more probable than
not — basically more than a 50% chance.

http://www.answers.com/topic/preponderance-of-evidence?cat=biz-fin

Thank you, anonymous lawyer, for that correction.

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• CBBC Newsround | UK | Look out, there are bedbugs about How to scare the children, from the Children’s BBC. Remember it was just a few years ago when the CBBC thought bed bugs were the same as dust mites. We’ve come a long way, babies.
• San Jose Mercury News - Action Line: The bedbugs are biting at tenants’ apartments
  San Jose Mercury News tenants’ Q and A thinks rental insurance may sometimes pay for bed bug-related expenses (or landlord’s insurance, or PCO’s insurance). We had heard from readers renter’s insurance never covered this. Would love to be proven wrong.
• Scabies? Malaria? Chagas? Tapeworm? Bee Attack? Rat Bite? Rabies? Bedbugs? Hantavirus? Snake Attack?
  “The producers of ‘The Deadliest Catch’ and ‘Ice Road Truckers’ are producing a new show for Discovery Channel and are looking for all types of unique and interesting tales of and disease and infestation… We can’t wait to hear yours!” Seriously, they consider your bed bug story (or, indeed, your scabies story) to be on par with these other horrors. Click the link above to audition, and be glad you did not have rabies.

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• Maya Rudolph redux
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Finally, someone in the business arena sees the light about bed bugs and the bottom line: and it’s not the flashing dollar signs of the over-the-counter bed bug spray industry, either. Kerry Miller published an article entitled “The Cost of Bed Bugs” yesterday in Business Week, about how business owners are suffering financial losses due to bed bugs in their rental properties, hotels, and other establishments.

While many with bed bugs in their homes might say, “So what, how does that help me?” I feel this is really good news–because if big business declares bed bugs a problem for their bottom line, we might see some more action in terms of halting their spread. And that helps all of us. But judging from this article, we’re not quite there yet.

Miller begins with the story of Rosemary Salinas, a manager for five buildings in San Francisco, who in 2004 dealt with an infested apartment in one of those properties, where the bed bugs spread to four other units, the hallways, and walls of the building. Eliminating it cost $40K plus a $9 payout to a tenant who threatened to sue.

Salinas now issues regular notices in every building she supervises reminding tenants to call management immediately if they suspect a bedbug infestation. Still, the property owners she has talked to haven’t been eager to do the same. “They don’t want anybody to suspect that they have them, or to think that they could have them,” she says.

Rental property owners aren’t the only ones with that attitude. In a statement on its Web site, the American Hotel & Lodging Assn.—an industry group that co-hosted an international bedbug symposium last fall—says the resurgence of bedbugs in the U.S. has “had a minimal impact on the vast majority of hotels, which maintain state-of-the-art sanitation and adhere to strict standards of cleanliness,” adding, for good measure: “Bedbugs are brought into hotels by guests; it is not a hotel sanitation issue.”

Where bed bug denial and the bed bug blame game meet, it’s not a pretty sight. Bed bugs are certainly brought into hotels by guests (or workers, or management, or in shipments). But they leave with other paying guests. And that is definitely the hotel’s problem. (We’ve talked about the American Hotel and Lodging Association’s head-in-the-sand attitudes about bed bugs before.)

One PCO had actual statistics on hotels they had worked on:

A study by the Steritech Group, a commercial and institutional pest management company, found that nearly 25% of the 700 hotels it tracked over a three-and-a-half year period between November, 2002, and April, 2006, required treatment for bedbugs, though of the 76,000 hotel rooms in the study, fewer than 1% were found to be infested. But the public stigma that bedbugs carry makes the line between discretion and transparency a delicate one to tread.

And, it appears that bed bugs have spread a lot since the 2002-2006 period Steritech studied.

The article goes on to describe how mattress encasements designed to protect against bed bugs have to be marketed as “allergen-proof” not bed bug-proof, in order to sell to hotels, and how bed bug dog services have to pretend they’re sniffing for mold when they visit nursing homes. I don’t mind not making clients panic, but lots of us actually do want to know hotels are trying to protect us from bed bugs.

A loss-control agent at an insurance company mentions he first started seeing bedbug-related claims from property owners two years ago.

Then there are other costs: the negative publicity, erosion in brand value, and drop in business that can result from a poorly handled infestation. Damage control (BusinessWeek.com, 10/17/07) is tricky since unhappy bedbug victims can easily spread word of infestations online via blogs or user-submitted travel review sites such as TripAdvisor (EXPE). “How many people hear about a hotel that had bedbugs and don’t stay there because of it? You just don’t know,” Morello says. Last year an Australian study estimated that bedbugs cost the Australian tourism industry $75 million annually. (No such estimates are available for the U.S.)

Therein lies part of the problem: we haven’t studied it yet in the US. We should learn from Australia–how much does their tourism industry take in per year? What sort of comparison can be made on the impact in the US if the rates of bed bugs are comparable?

Other interesting tidbits here:
Most property owners prefer to settle bed bug claims out of court.

Oh, and–

To treat infested units in her San Francisco building, Salinas hired a company to empty each apartment and freeze the contents for 48 hours. (Extreme temperatures are one of the few reliable ways to kill bedbugs.) The cost: about $2,000 per unit.

It must have been very, very sub-zero freezing. And something must have been done to the rooms themselves. But I would love to know more about companies willing to remove and freeze your stuff. It would be wonderful for people trying to move (many of whom hire someone to gas their belongings with vikane to avoid moving bed bugs). Both methods are exhorbitant, but surely when they become commonplace, the prices must come down?

There’s so much more here, I can’t respond to it all, but let me leave you with the ominous (and stupid) ideas with which the article closed:

[Lawyer Christian] Hardigree has fielded phone calls from property owners interested in putting an addendum to lease agreements holding tenants responsible for bedbug infestations. Others are interested in tweaking the language of contracts with pest-control companies so they can sue if the bedbugs return. (Her response to both: “You can put that language in, but I can’t tell you it would be upheld by a court.”) In any case, bedbugs aren’t a problem that can be solved by the wave of a gavel.

These ideas are based on a misunderstanding of how bed bugs work, from a scientific standpoint. You cannot blame the person who discovers and complains of bed bugs, for bringing them in. There really is no way of knowing when and how bed bugs were introduced into a unit. There’s no way of proving how long they were there, since people do not necessarily react to bites, or see bugs. And even if they do react, it may take them a long time to do so.

As for the second idea, many good PCOs who know bed bugs will only offer a brief warranty (60 days is considered pretty good right now). My understanding is that this is because (a) the property owner may be refusing to properly inspect and treat the whole building, and so resurgence may be inevitable in some cases, (b) people can bring in bed bugs repeatedly even they do not realize the source, and (c) bed bugs can be very stealthy–it would be hard to prove the bed bugs were not hiding out in a sealed bag, for example, that was unpacked. (This happens.)

On the other hand, many infestations take 3, 4, or more treatments by traditional methods. If PCOs re-treat aggressively at proper intervals throughout a 60 day period, then customers have a good shot at waving bed bugs goodbye. However, some PCOs are not up to date on the latest methods, or the stealthy habits of bed bugs. And in those cases, unfortunate customers often end up having to seek another treatment provider after the sixty days. It’s bad for the business reputation of the original guys, but some people are just out to make a fast buck. In the long run, let’s hope the best PCOs thrive and expand without compromising on quality.

I would hope that we can press for tenants, owners, and PCOs to be accountable and to use best practices, cooperatively, to fight bed bugs. There are people busy figuring out what those best practices might be. Give up the denial and the bed bug blame game: it’s pointless. Let’s fight the real enemy.

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• “We have to have a bed bug state of mind,” says Michael Potter at Bed Bug Control Seminar yesterday

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Terry says, “A pest control program for bed bugs is very detailed. You’ve got to get all the crevices. We are doing a little more than we really need to, but it’s to make sure we don’t have a problem in the future.”

That means Terry’s son, Tony, has to bag contents of every locker in the school, and then spray those contents with an insecticide.

Tony and his mother are wearing only gloves now, but when the heavy fumigation gets underway, they’ll be wearing face masks, too.

I am interested in these methods, since I have not heard PCOs here talking about spraying into bags of belongings. Perhaps a PCO would tell us what this might be.

I initially thought it was a good thing that Bracken County Schools were taking bed bugs seriously after finding a bed bug in school, since cities like New York City are so slow to take action against similar situations. My initial positive sense was based on Bracken County’s willingness to treat schools for bed bugs. I thought that their treatment of every school in the district was based on a sense that bed bugs must be more widespread than in just this one school.

Now, however, I am becoming more concerned about the community’s response, especially their apparent obsession with pinpointing its source. It betrays a lack of education about bed bugs and their behavior, which appears to be a prevalent problem elsewhere too.

Parents in Brooksville are divided about the schools closing an extra day just for bed bugs.

Elizabeth Aulick, a mother of two Bracken County students says, “Yeah, it does concern me, but the letter I got said they only found one bug. If it’s one bug isolated to one child, keep him home for a few days.”

A mother of three Bracken County students, including one at the Middle School says, “I guess it’s a little unexpected. I never expected something like this, but I guess it’s a good thing. Just to be on the safe side. It didn’t both me, I said, ‘Well, that’s fine.’”

The school fumigation in Bracken County is getting the full support of the county health department there.

I am glad the health department in Bracken County recognizes bed bugs as a concern, since many don’t. However, I have to say that what’s being said about the child in this case is absurd.

People in Bracken County must not associate the schools’ bed bug issue, if they indeed have one, with this one student who may have had the bed bug on his things or on his clothing. Bed bugs can live and breed in schools or in school buses or public transportation, and they can crawl onto students at any of these locations (as well as many others). As we have taken pains to explain in the past, the presence of a bed bug on a person or their things absolutely does not prove the person brought the bed bug in.

All parents, including those of the child who was bitten by the bed bug, must search at home and have a qualified PCO inspect if anyone is complaining of bites or if they see any bed bugs or possible signs. However, it is crucial that parents and school officials realize that bed bugs are not lice, and do not live on people. They crawl on, feed, and run away. If a bed bug is found on a person in a school, it does not mean the person brought the bed bug to the school.

I would assume the Bracken County School officials know this, since they are treating every school, and not just the one the bed bug was found in. And yet it does not sound like the parents or media have been picking up on that fact.

If the child did indeed have had an infestation at home and brought them into the school, then his family, too, caught them from somewhere. They spread easily. And everyone should be alert. Everyone should be asking where this family might have picked up bed bugs: parents’ workplace? YMCA? School? Bus? Motel? Because where they got them, you can get them too.

However, the child should not be blamed, nor should he be kept home. People with active infestations need to take some steps to avoid spreading bed bugs. Treating the child himself as if he were contagious is an ignorant mistake.

• Schools in Bracken County, KY shut down due to bed bugs
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• New York City public schools continue to be treated for bed bugs
• Spring break bed bug warnings!

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Having heard nothing since then, I was glad to see that yesterday the New York Observer (in their 10/23 online and 10/29 print edition) re-told the bed bugs at Cadwalader story, that the Wall Street Journal’s WSJ.com law blog (housed in the same building as Cadwalader!) covered the Observer’s coverage. After all, the more people realize you can have bed bugs at work–even in very classy workplaces–the better.

The Observer’s David Lat also edits the online legal tabloid AbovetheLaw.com, where we picked up the original leaked-memo bed bug story. We missed this, but on October 3rd, Above the Law also covered a second report of bed bugs in the same offices, this time on the 20th floor:

It is believed that said bedbug infiltrated the premises through a delivery or box shipment. Perhaps it was hidden in a document production from opposing counsel?

While this is entirely possible, since bed bugs had previously been found in the same building, I would not be surprised if other locations in the building were infested. Maybe (gasp!) the blamed employee was fired for nothing. It is very difficult to locate blame for a bed bug infestation.

And remember, the original memo made this claim:

“A single treatment by an exterminator usually controls bed bugs and prevents reinfestation for several months.”

Perhaps one treatment was not enough.

In October, management was more careful to avoid the leaked-memo scenario:

Attorneys were notified of this breach in CWT’s bed bug security via email. We haven’t seen the email message, which we understand was protected against forwarding, printing, or copying.

Too bad. The first memo was fascinating.

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• Another top NYC lawfirm gets bed bugs

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His lease was terminated Sept. 27, about a month after he said he posted fliers alleging that bedbugs had invaded 11 apartments, including his own. A hearing on the eviction notice will take place Oct. 26 at Superior Court in Morristown.

Rutgers Village, in an Oct. 2 court filing, placed the bedbug blame squarely on Veghte.

The apartment complex alleged that Veghte, on or before Sept. 17, “either intentionally or through gross negligence, created an infestation condition within his apartment” that he initially failed to report. The landlord also alleged that Veghte refused to cooperate with extermination efforts.

How could Veghte have “intentionally” caused a bed bug infestation within his apartment? Does this mean he sought out bed bugs, brought them in, and infested his home?!?

How could he have “created” the infestation through “gross negligence”? While it is true that someone might have bed bugs for a time and not report them, thus allowing the problem to escalate, we know that different people react to bites in different ways, and bed bugs can be hard to find. Unless they are crawling over the walls all day, it seems like it would be nearly impossible to prove how long someone had them and known about it.

Failing to report the infestation promptly is another matter, and we really do not know what went on there.

Parsippany housing coordinator Rena Plaxe said she was contacted by Veghte several times but did not intervene in the dispute. Plaxe said it appeared that the landlord had acted reasonably.

“From what I understand, he found a bedbug. He put it in a Ziploc bag. He took it to the management office. They set up an extermination process for his apartment, but he’s been unable or unwilling to properly prepare the apartment. Therein lies the problem,” said Plaxe, adding that the landlord was able to do only “a cursory treatment” as a result.

It does sound as if “unable” to prepare is more likely than “unwilling” to prepare. Read on:

Veghte, a former truck driver who said he had not worked since 2002 due to three herniated disks and osteoarthritis in his neck and back, said he was unable to remove items from cabinets and closets as requested by the landlord to aid in extermination.

“I’m disabled. I asked them for help,” Veghte said.

What should disabled people do, if they ask landlords for help with prep and do not get it? Who can they, or the landlord, call?

And why would a landlord evict a disabled person who could not do their prep? Veghte claims there’s more to the story.

Rob Jennings reports for the Daily Record that Veghte feels he is being evicted because he told neighbors about the bed bugs via a flyer he distributed on August 25th. He received the eviction order on Sept. 27, and the building sent tenants a letter about bed bugs on October 10th. Regardless of anything else that happened, the building clearly did not warn Veghte’s fellow tenants about the possibility they were infested until six and a half weeks after Veghte distributed the flyers. They had to have known of this possibility since at least late September, at least two weeks before October 11, since the man was evicted then.

Assuming Veghte did distribute the flyers without notifying the landlord of his infestation directly, which was not a good idea, several weeks at most could be proven to have passed between his knowing about the infestation and his notifying the office as per Plaxe’s description.

His lease was terminated Sept. 27, about a month after he said he posted fliers alleging that bedbugs had invaded 11 apartments, including his own. A hearing on the eviction notice will take place Oct. 26 at Superior Court in Morristown.

Veghte’s being represented by Legal Aid.

This is not the first time someone has been evicted for not doing the prep required for treatment. Last December, multiple families (including one with a disabled son) were evicted from an Edmonton, Alberta building for not properly preparing for bed bug treatment. Read more about that here. In that case and this one, the evicted individuals claimed to be unable to complete all the steps of required preparation. These can vary depending on the PCO. In the Edmonton building, the tenants complained of not being able to move furniture and other items, and not having anywhere to move them to. As the article implies, they may not have fully understood the reasons for prep, or how to go about it.

In the current New Jersey case, Veghte is disabled. Although I understand that landlords do not feel they can do tenants’ prep, it simply is not acceptable that disabled persons, or for that matter, elderly people, busy single parents, or anyone else who has difficulty doing required preparations, should be evicted. Preparations can be time-consuming and demanding on one’s energy and physical abilities. If people need help, then there must be government agencies who will provide assistance in cases where people simply cannot do the physical labor, or do it quickly enough.

Make no mistake: tenants must report bed bugs promptly if they are aware of them (and whether Veghte did or not is uncertain), and prep needs to be completed properly before treatment. Not doing so puts neighbors as well as the property in jeopardy, and I am not supporting anyone who fails to do those things. However, people who need help with prep must get this help. We cannot expect disabled or elderly people, or those with other legitimate limitations, to simply find help somehow. As a society that does not evict people for being physically challenged, we simply have to provide help.

If this man is really being evicted for not doing prep, his eviction amounts to discrimination, and it’s just plain wrong.

Let this story be a warning to tenants: notify your landlord promptly, and in writing, the minute you suspect a bed bug infestation. People whose first instinct is to simply self-treat could conceivably be accused of not reporting an infestation. In NYC, landlords are often happy to try and evict you, since they can raise the rent for the next guy. Don’t give them any excuse for doing so.

And a warning to landlords: make sure your tenants understand how and why they need to prepare. Many good PCOs will give a talk at the building for tenants about the hows, the whys, and the wherefores. Education is key here. However, you have a responsibility too–to let tenants know of neighbors’ infestations. If you don’t, you may be sued, like this Chicago landlord. All’s fair in love and torts.

And a warning to the rest of the world: we must find ways to help people who cannot prepare for treatment.

Or there are soon going to be a lot more disabled people, elderly people, and parents of young children on the streets. What a shame.

• More from Edmonton bed bug evictions case
• Bedbug evictions: Edmonton tenants evicted because they did not prepare for spraying
• Still more from Nashua, New Hampshire: fewer bed bugs at 23-25 Temple St.
• Bed bugs & tenant organizing: don’t take this lying down

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Courtesy of the CBC’s links from its fine story on bed bugs (which remains the best television clip on bed bugs to date, hands down, in my humble opinion), a rundown on who pays for tenants’ bed bug treatment according to Province. It is really complicated. I am not even going to try and paraphrase it.

However, the easy thing to say is that the law is pretty much on the tenant’s side in Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario, and Vancouver, British Columbia. Nevertheless, folks in those areas should read the information on your location; it is definitely not always cut and dried, and you have responsibilities as well as rights. Seek legal advice or advice from a tenant’s organization in your area if you need help understanding the laws the CBC page links to.

In most other areas, the responsibility for paying for bed bug treatment varies a great deal Province by Province and according to the situation.

Yes, you guessed it: they want to play the blame game.

In some places it depends on whether the tenant can prove they did not bring bed bugs into the apartment, in others it depends on whether the landlord can prove tenants did bring them in. In still others, arbitration is provided where tenants and landlords cannot come to an agreement.

• New York City: Who’s responsible for paying for bed bug treatment? Complicated, in some cases.
• Halifax: where the bed bug “blame game” is the law
• added to the “Tenants and Landlords FAQ”: Washington, D.C. and Florida
• Brown student wants to provide free bed bug treatment to those who can’t pay

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