Sarasota County residents Jared and Erin NesSmith are suing JUUL, saying the e-cigarette company got their 15-year-old daughter, identified as A.N., hooked on vaping. The teen now suffers from seizures — a complication of nicotine ingestion, according to the lawsuit. [The Schlesinger Law Firm] ▲ A man displays his JUUL electronic cigarette while shopping at a convenience store in Hoboken, N.J., in this Dec. 20, 2018, photo. [AP Photo / Julio Cortez] ▲

Lawsuit against e-cigarette maker and Altria claims they intentionally target teens

SARASOTA COUNTY — A Sarasota County girl and her parents are suing an e-cigarette maker and two tobacco giants for allegedly breaking federal laws by intentionally targeting teenagers while falsely denying doing so.

The class action lawsuit, brought by Sarasota County residents Erin and Jared NesSmith and their daughter, identified in court documents only as A.N., accuses e-cigarette company JUUL Labs Inc. and tobacco company Altria Group Inc., which owns Philip Morris USA Inc., the maker of Marlboro, of violating federal racketeering laws by purposely exploiting adolescents and getting them hooked on the aerosol devices that deliver a more powerful hit of nicotine than cigarettes, while denying the calculated marketing moves, according to court documents filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida on April 15.

Philip Morris recently acquired a 35 percent ownership interest in JUUL.

The family is seeking damages under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act and for fraud, product liability and deceptive trade practices for themselves and potentially thousands of other unnamed plaintiffs in the suit.

"JUUL knew that JUUL e-cigarettes were not safe for nonsmokers, and posed a risk of aggravating addiction in those already addicted to cigarettes," the suit states.

The family could not be reached for comment.

A JUUL representative denied in an email to the Herald-Tribune that the company targets teens.

"Our product is intended to be a viable alternative for current adult smokers only. We do not want nonnicotine users, especially youth, to ever try our product," JUUL representative Ted Kwong said. "To this end, we have launched an aggressive action plan to combat underage use as it is antithetical to our mission. To the extent these cases allege otherwise, they are without merit and we will defend our mission throughout this process."

In the suit, the girl, 15, claims she is addicted to JUUL and now suffers from seizures — a complication of nicotine ingestion, according to the lawsuit. The teen began using the electronic cigarettes, which look like an USB drive and comes in fruity flavors such as mango, when she was 14. She was unaware the device contained nicotine when she began "JUULing," and inadvertently on occasion swallowed the e-liquid nicotine in the JUUL device, according to court documents.

"Mimicking Big Tobacco's past marketing practices, defendants prey on youth to recruit replacement smokers for financial gain," the suit states.

Her parents and their lawyers say she has fallen victim to the e-cigarette epidemic affecting youth.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, e-cigarette use from 2011 to 2014 among high school students soared from 1.5 percent to 13.4 percent, and among middle school students from 0.6 percent to 3.9 percent. Spending on e-cigarette advertising — which often includes bright colors attractive to teens and depicts smoking e-cigarettes as cool and hip — rose from $6.4 million in 2011 to an estimated $115 million in 2014.

The suit also cites additional CDC data that found 4.9 million middle and high school students were current users of a tobacco product in 2018, meaning they used such products in the past 30 days. That figure represents an increase of 1.3 million users since 2017.

Sarasota County schools this year began tracking youth use of e-cigarettes, which the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has characterized as an epidemic. Local school officials in January found 224 documented incidents of e-cigarette use in schools. That number has since increased to 327, district spokeswoman Tracey Beeker said in an email. There are 43,000 students in the district.

JUUL's plan for deterring youth use, according to the company's website, includes deactivating Facebook and Instagram accounts for marketing, suspending the sale and distribution of nontobacco and nonmenthol JUUL pods to more than 90,000 retail stores and requiring online consumers to be at least 21 to purchase its products.

But the family's lawyer, Scott Schlesinger of the Fort Lauderdale-based Schlesinger Law Firm, claims JUUL's aim is to hook people when they're young and most susceptible to addiction.

"There's an opportunity to get customers when they're vulnerable in their youth, because that's when the brain is vulnerable to this drug addiction," Schlesinger said, adding the pending litigation could last for years. "That's the dirty little secret of the nicotine delivery industry."

The FDA has the power to cap nicotine levels in e-cigarettes, but hasn't proposed any standard. For cigarettes, there's no limit on nicotine, although the FDA has taken preliminary steps toward reducing levels to help smokers quit. JUUL, like all e-cigarettes in the country, has not been approved to help smokers quit. The FDA isn't expected to begin reviewing the contents and health effects of e-cigarettes for at least two more years, according to a recent report by the Associated Press.

Juul has published little peer-reviewed research, and only in the last year have independent researchers begun studying its formula. The company says each of its full-strength pods delivers about as much nicotine as a pack of cigarettes. Researchers at Portland State University analyzed the concentration of Juul's full-strength pod against nine other nicotine formulas on the market in 2017. Juul's nicotine level dwarfed its competitors, in some cases by twentyfold, according to the AP report.

Meanwhile, Schlesinger is considering filing a federal petition asking the courts to prohibit retailers from selling the devices.

"An adolescent nicotine epidemic is a public health emergency that requires immediate action," Schlesinger said.