Q: Consumed urine that someone had intentionally placed in a drink. What would be the charges?
A friend of mine has awful roommates that constantly harass her verbally, and recently physically. After returning to her school(Texas State University) with a few of her friends, they decided to celebrate by having some Fireball. After opening the bottle of liquor and not noticing the smell at first, 3 individuals proceeded to take drinks from the contaminated bottle.
The next day, they confronted the roommates about putting urine into the liquor and got a verbal conformation that is was in fact urine. The smell is very noticeable on the bottle and testing will be done on said bottle to certify it is urine along with DNA samples.
From my understanding this could be assault, harrassment, and reckless conduct charges. No police reports have been filed yet. This situation took place on 3/6/2021 and police reports will be filed shortly.
A:
1. Ewwww.
2. Unfortunately, there are unlikely to be any criminal consequences for the person who did this.
There is a relatively new crime named Indecent Assault that can be committed with urine, but it is a sex crime and only applies in situations where urine was used to gratify someone's sexual desire... so that doesn't match the facts of this case. There is a law against prisoners exposing guards to urine and other bodily fluids, but that doesn't match either.
If nobody was injured then it wasn't a normal class A or above Assault... and none of the lower levels of assault can't be committed recklessly. The incident you described doesn't fit the legal definition of Harassment either. Texas has no crime named "reckless conduct." We do have a crime named Deadly Conduct which can be committed recklessly but it requires "imminent danger of serious bodily injury" so it doesn't fit the facts. There is another crime named Disorderly Conduct but it can't be committed recklessly ... and also doesn't fit the facts.
Back in 2007, there was a bill proposed in the Texas House of Representatives to create a crime called Assault with Bodily Fluids ... but that bill never became law.
There might be a crime somewhere in the Health & Safety Code about improper disposal of waste... but I wouldn't be shocked if a cop wouldn't bother to go looking for it. Law enforcement DNA labs are backlogged by over six months, and close to a year in some cases. If they can't get timely results for rapes then it is easy to imagine this angle not going anywhere... especially absent a recorded confession.
If it turns out there is no law against this behavior, that doesn't mean the person won't be arrested and charged with something.... even if the definition of the law does not technically fit. Perhaps the defendant is too ashamed, stupid, or cheap to hire a decent attorney to fight the charge. You could be convicted of assaulting Frosty the Snowman if you are foolish enough to enter a plea of guilty or no contest.
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