Well, I'll try to keep it brief even though our situation is getting complicated. I begin by thanking all BP members for any insight they can provide as we need help. I will also state that it was not wise to not get 2 other opinions/quotes. That won't happen again.

We own a SFH out of state with long term tenants. Recently, and in the past there has been large rainfall amounts and being on a side of hill, we have water runoff, rutting and basement moisture issues. We have our go to grading contractor who we've used in the past assess the situation. Mold was discovered in the basement on a Friday and by Monday we had a plan to put up our tenants in a vacation rental for 2 week starting yesterday February 22nd.

We were led to believe that the problem was, is an will be very severe now. However, what put the crack in the dike so to speak was my wife's parents visiting the home and viewing with their own eyes and to them it didn't appear to be that bad really. However, I know that just a visual inspection does not necessarily give you the whole picture.

Once my wife's parents expressed their doubt, we believe the fear tactics started. We received many phone calls, voicemails, emails and texts now stating how dire it had become and we were sent a email with a photo of mold in a petri dish. Supposedly, this was claimed to be from a swap sample from our basement, grown and photographed by the contractor himself. I even had a conversation very clearly and explicitly asking him if this photo was his, taken my him, on his phone, of a swap growth from out basement. It turns out, this was a lie and through Google's Reverse Image Lookup site, the original author took the photo is 2003, over THIRTEEN years ago. The contractor has denied this. Repeatedly. Even after presented the facts. I work in media/photography and it's blatantly obvious this image in stolen. He's also claiming that he has legal responsibility to "condemn" the house and report to EPA. Again, more scare tactics as after every email, text and message, he wraps it up by stating this can all go away if we simply proceed with the job.

Here's where we are today. The bill for the entire job was $7500.00. We are willing to pay for the work that is already completed (exterior grading) to the tune of $1250.00. He wants us to pay for his materials ordered for mold remediation which he is claiming $3000.00. We need to know if we have a case as we are happy to see this through till the end.

If there's any other details you need to make any sort of determinations, please don't hesitate to ask and as always a big thank you to our fellow BP's!

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Do I have a case/legal recourse? based upon Fraudulent Photo?

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