I think the biggest instance in history of something happening as you describe was when the first test blast of the A-bomb was made at White Sands. They wondered whether it would set the atmosphere afire. But they did it anyway.
Of a similar vein was the possibility of CERN (I think it was) producing a black hole that would devour the earth in time. But they did it anyway.
But those concerns were inherent to the thing. Probably wouldn’t happen, but given the humility of knowing there may be consequences you don’t know, they considered those possibilities - and decided they were worth the risk.
This thread, however, implies the whole technology should be foregone because somebody might do something bizarre with it to someone else. From someone who has been following VR from the beginning (I still have an iGlasses in my attic) and has seen plenty of hype/hysteria about it, my reaction is: [groan] shut up already, that’s stupid. Might make for an interesting movie plot, that’s about as far as that “threat” is going. The concept fixates on the VR part, overlooking (like with criminals & guns) the bullies part: their goal is to abuse someone somehow, VR or not, with plenty of ways to do it.