Legal Question in Consumer Law in Virginia

I believe that Orkin pest control may be poisoning my pet dogs. I moved into my current rental house in Febuary of this year to discover a problem with

roaches and a landlord who refused to pay for any treatment. I decided in order to be able to live comfortably for the duration of my year lease I would have

to pay for extermination myself. I hired the well known Orkin for a year service contract, which started in April of this year. Following, one of my four

house dogs began having frequent episodes of vomiting. This continued, intermittently over a period of a few months, until she finally became so ill she would not eat and quickly went downhill, spiking a high fever, seizuring and eventually dying in my arms at work. Please note, I am a licensed veterinary

technican and took my dog with me to work all the time for treatment during her illness. The veterinarians never could pinpoint a cause for her illness or find a

reason why she didn't respond to the various treatments we tried on her, and I did everything recommended for her. She died on October 2nd at 7 years old.

Over the past 3 days one of my other dogs began to vomit her food after eating, which is exactly what my deceased dog did in the first initial months of her

illness. This started on Saturday and the day before she had torn up, and possibly ingested, an area of carpet adjacent to one of the baseboards in the house. She has tried to rip up carpet in a couple of areas in the house since the pesticide treatment started and I had wondered if some of the chemicals may smell sweet to her or if there are termites or some other insect activity that she is reacting too. This is not normal behavior for her and has only occured in this house since we've been getting treatments from Orkin. Previously we lived in the same house for 7 years, with wall to wall carpet that she never once

attemted to rip up (we never had pest extermination at that house either). Over the past 24 hours, seeing my dog become ill, I've started to think it is the chemicals Orkin is spraying in my home that is making my dog sick and potentially led to the death of my other dog. I do NOT want to risk loosing another

pet to this or my own health. Orkin was informed of my house pets when we made the initial agreement and claimed it was "safe to treat around pets but now I'm not so sure. Looking at my service receipts I can say the chemicals I am aware of them using include Pyrethrin, Piperonyl Butoxide, Cyfluthrin,

Bifenthrin, Abamectin and Hydroprene. I am planning on calling and attempting to cancell my service contract with them, which I'm sure will be a battle because their customer service has not been good either (missed appointments, reminder calls not made, scheduling changes without my knowledge, etc.), but what about the potential health risk here? I have a mounting veterinary bill for services on one dog who is now dead and potentially more to come with another dog who is sick now. I don't believe this is all a coincidence and think Orkin may be liable for the damage they have/are causing.

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