A Special Message to My Deadbeat Ex-Housemate

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• And Joey is MUCH nicer than I am.

  -- The Wife.

• How many people who will potentially interact with him will search for that phrase? Why not instead have his full name in the title of this post, so that people searching for it (i.e. people who have dealings with him) will see your story?

• Putting his name in the post is certainly more effective but might leave you open to a libel charge unless you have the paperwork to prove he's in arrears.

  The bad news is that your legal remedy for the phone bill is likely exhausted as the Limitations Act, 2002 specifies that you have two years from date of discovery to initiate an action. The limitation for rent is generally longer (six years from date of discovery, I think, under the Real Property Limitations Act, 1990). Take all this with a small grain of salt, as I am not a lawyer so you should check this all out with someone trained and licensed in the craft.

  Good luck on recovery, though.

• Joey,

  s.24(5) of the new Limitations Act reads: If the claim was discovered before the effective date (of Jan. 1, 2004), the former limitation period (before this new law in 2004) applies.

  Arguably, the former 6 yr. period applies here. You've got 1 yr., more or less, to file your Statment of Claim Small Claims Court. File the claim, get judgment & then garnish him at work, at his bank until you get paid. Even if he's a deadbeat. There's my pro bono work for the day.

  With sweet sentiments always,

  Nick, your asshole friend

• Does repeating the same link on the same page actually have a greater effect than a single link? That would surprise me.

• He's in the U.S.. A "blogslap" is probably the my last best shot at getting the cashola.

• Probably not: the power of the repetition is more psychological than technological.

• Might I suggest a little special display at Shmoocon? He's apparently a member of the group. A public shaming (among his security peers) may be in order. It's a little ways off but you might get maximal bang for the buck.

• file the claim, get the judgment, then get a garnishment order, if you know which US bank he deals with, you may be able to garnish the Canadian office of that bank (ie. Citibank, Bank of America, etc.) to get yer $$. Plus, you can maintain the judgment for 20years & enforce it if he ever returns to Canada or ever has assets in Canada in the future, plus interest.

• and depending on which jurisdiction he's in, you may be able to enforce your Ontario judgment in that state if they have a reciprocal enforcement of judgments statute similar to ours (eg. Ontario judgment may be enforceable in another state if said state is a signatory). I think I recently read a case about a US state judgment being enforceable in Ontario. Later, N