Legal Question in Criminal Law in Michigan

Re: Help

You may want to report this to police as a harassing/threatening phone call ... even if it does not lead to a criminal charge.

If there is more than one time when he threatens/harasses you, you might want to apply in your local circuit court for a personal protection order (a restraining order). You would be looking at a non-domestic PPO because you don't appear to qualify for a "domestic relations PPO" which can issue based on just one event.

Obviously, you are suffering the consequences of some choices that you made (albeit with good intentions of helping someone out). All those TV Judge shows in the afteroon are chock-a-block fully of "clusters" like this one, where people are sniping at each other, and maybe NObody has truly clean hands. Most of those cases are really contract (or "implied contract") cases, and the TV judges make rulings on that area of the law.

You had nothing in writing between you and your friend (like the landlord did with YOU) that laid out everyone's duties. You should have at least had something from your friend that said she agreed to not let anyone else live there without your written permission, that she was responsibile for damage, etc.

The fact that you "trusted" someone does not create a cause of action against these people, or a defense to your landlord suing you for the damages.

You could be sued by your landlord for the damages caused by these people. You risked violating your lease by sub-letting it to another person and/or allowing people to live there who were not on the lease or were not approved by your landlord.

Ironically, the one thing you may have done correctly was thoring this squatter's stuff into the dumpster. He had no property interest in the place -- he wasn't paying rent, so he did not attain "Tenant status".

I don't know why you feel like you "owe" him something for the stuff you put by the dumpster. Let him sue you in small claims court (surely, his stuff can't be worth more than $1,700), and then you counter-sue him for the damages that he caused (that you can prove). Just like on TV.