This law is called the Drug Dealer Liability Act.

This law aims to help people and organizations recover money after being harmed by illegal drugs. It allows parents, employers, insurers, and others who pay for drug treatment to get compensation from those involved in selling illegal drugs. The law also seeks to make drug dealers bear the costs they cause and discourage people from entering the illegal drug market through the threat of losing money. Additionally, it encourages drug users to identify their suppliers and seek funds for their treatment from them.

This law section highlights that both the criminal and civil justice systems play vital roles in combating illegal controlled substances. While criminal law punishes offenders, the civil system provides a way for victims to seek compensation for harm caused by the sale and distribution of illegal drugs.

The law emphasizes that those involved in drug marketing should be financially responsible for damages their actions cause in the community. It serves as a deterrent, particularly for individuals who might consider entering the drug trade, especially if they have assets or engage in casual dealing at work.

The statute holds all participants in the illegal drug market liable, including small dealers often overlooked by criminal investigations. These smaller participants can increase the number of users and eventually become major dealers; therefore, this law aims to discourage them by threatening them with legal liability.

This law defines various terms related to the illegal drug trade and associated offenses. It explains that 'marketing of illegal controlled substances' covers everything from possession and sale to manufacturing illegal drugs. An 'individual user' is someone who uses an illegal drug, and offenses are categorized by severity from Level 1 to Level 4 based on the quantity of drugs involved. Levels range from small amounts for personal use to large quantities for sale or manufacture. Participation in the drug trade includes actions like transporting or selling drugs, but not merely buying for personal use. 'Person' includes individuals and organizations, and terms like 'place of illegal activity' and 'place of participation' refer to the locations where drug-related actions occur. The law specifies certain drugs like cocaine and methamphetamine as covered substances.

If you knowingly help sell illegal drugs in this state, you can be sued for damages if someone gets hurt because of the drug use. However, law enforcement and those working with them are not held liable if they are involved in selling drugs as part of an official investigation.

This law allows certain people to sue for damages if they are harmed by someone using illegal drugs. People who can sue include family members, employers, medical facilities, insurers, and others affected, like those exposed in the womb or injured by the drug user. They can seek damages from those who sold or participated in selling the drugs, especially if those actions occurred in the same place as the individual's drug use.

Damages one can claim include both financial losses like medical costs and lost wages and personal losses like emotional distress. The law also allows for extra punitive damages, lawyer's fees, and court costs.

This law states that if you use illegal drugs, you generally can't sue for damages caused by that drug use, unless you meet certain conditions. First, you must tell the authorities all you know about your drug suppliers. Second, you must not have used any illegal drugs for at least 30 days before filing the lawsuit. Third, you need to stay drug-free while the lawsuit is ongoing. If you qualify, you can only sue the person who was involved in dealing the specific drug you used. You can recover economic losses like medical costs and lost earnings, reasonable attorney fees, and court costs.

This law states that if someone is insured, no third party can pay financial damages or provide legal defense on their behalf under an insurance contract. Additionally, any legal claims allowed by this law cannot be transferred to any public or government-funded agencies or institutions, whether directly or indirectly.

This law outlines how responsibility for damages is determined for individuals involved in the illegal drug trade, based on the severity of their involvement. If a person is involved in a level 1 offense, they are assumed to be responsible for 25% of the damages. For a level 2 offense, they would be responsible for half of the damages. Level 3 offenses make a person responsible for 75% of the damages. Lastly, for a level 4 offense, a person is presumed to be fully responsible for all damages. These are rebuttable presumptions, meaning a person can contest this assumed responsibility in court.

This law section allows multiple plaintiffs to join together in a single lawsuit if they have used illegal drugs in overlapping periods and share at least one common market for those drugs. Similarly, multiple defendants can be joined if they are liable to at least one of the plaintiffs.

Plaintiffs and defendants don't have to participate in every part of the legal proceedings, and the court can issue judgment based on each party's individual rights and liabilities.

This law explains that if you're injured because you used illegal drugs, you can still sue for damages, but any compensation you receive may be reduced based on your own responsibility for using the drugs. It's up to the person you're suing to prove how responsible you were, and they have to provide strong evidence.

Also, if you're not a drug user, you can't be held responsible unless you intentionally gave money to someone to buy illegal drugs.

If someone is liable under this law, they can go after others who are also liable to share the responsibility, called contribution. This can happen during the original lawsuit or in a new lawsuit. The person suing can try to collect from any party that another defendant thinks should also pay.

This law outlines how evidence must be presented in cases related to illegal controlled substances under this division. If you're trying to prove someone liable, you need clear and convincing evidence, but other parts of the case only need to be proved by a majority of the evidence. If someone has a criminal conviction for selling illegal drugs under state or federal law, they can't deny being part of the illegal drug market, and this conviction can be used as initial proof they were involved in dealing the specific drugs in question. However, even if someone hasn't been criminally convicted, you can still bring a case against them as stated in another related law section.

This law lets someone who is suing (the plaintiff) ask the court to temporarily take control of enough of the defendant's assets to cover the potential judgment they might win. This can happen before the case is decided, but it is subject to certain conditions outlined in a different legal section.

The specific rules and procedures for making this request are detailed in another part of the legal code starting at Section 485.010.

This section outlines the time limits for bringing legal claims related to the use of illegal drugs. Generally, you must file a claim within one year after the illegal drug was provided. The clock starts ticking when you become aware of the harm caused by the drug and realize that the drug is the cause of that harm.

For the person who provided the drug, the deadline to bring a claim doesn't end until one year after they are convicted of a crime related to that drug, or as specified by other laws.

This law states that you cannot take legal action against someone for something they did before this law was officially put into effect.

This law says that if part of it is found to be invalid or doesn't apply to a specific person or situation, the rest of the law still stands and will continue to apply to others.