Juul products. Photo: Jonathan Weiss/Shutterstock.com

Amid similar lawsuits across the nation, a Connecticut mother is suing the makers of Juul e-cigarettes, claiming the products caused her teenage son to experience seizures after he became addicted to nicotine.

San Francisco-based Juul Labs, founded in 2015 as an arm of cigarette manufacturer Altria Group Inc. and its subsidiary, Philip Morris USA Inc., has faced recent allegations that it marketed its products to underage users. The most recent lawsuit in Connecticut was filed by Sherman resident Catherine Faulds on behalf of her son, identified as "G.F."

Faulds claims her son "developed a nicotine addiction and suffered multiple seizures as a result of his use of a Juul device and flavored Juul pods." The lawsuit alleges Juul's fraudulent concealment "was a substantial factor" in G.F.'s "significant exposure to toxic substances, which may cause or contribute to plaintiff's seizures." Faulds also accuses Juul of unfair, unlawful and deceptive trade practices.

The lawsuit, which seeks compensatory and punitive damages of at least $75,000, claims G.F. began using the company's fruit flavors primarily mint and mango in October 2018, when he was 14 years old.

The lawsuit claims the company markets to teens by selling fruit-flavored products and featuring young models in advertisements. In G.F.'s case. the lawsuit alleges he developed a "severe nicotine addiction" and by the time of his initial seizure was vaping every day and consuming a pack of Juul pods per week.

G.F., the lawsuit says, experienced his first seizure while on vacation with his family in Virginia in July 2019. The lawsuit states he "experienced an intense head rush, and he began to seize for approximately five minutes." The teen was hospitalized and required a lumbar puncture, chest X-ray, CT scan of his head and blood tests.

Due to addiction to Juul products, the lawsuit says, G.F. continued to use e-cigarettes and suffered another seizure in a locker room at his high school Oct. 19.

The lawsuit claims G.F. was unaware vaping could cause seizures and that his use has "permanently injured and altered his developing brain."

Lawsuits have been filed concurrently in the San Francisco Unified School District and four nearby school districts, claiming Juul's marketing efforts have resulted in students getting hooked on e-cigarettes. The company is also fighting lawsuits in Florida, Illinois and New York, among other states.

Juul's media relations department did not respond to a request for comment Thursday, and the company had not yet assigned an attorney to handle the Connecticut complaint.

As with other lawsuits against Juul, the Faulds suit claims the company intentionally marketed its products to minors. After Gov. Ned Lamont took note of the potential health issue this summer, Connecticut increased the age for the legal use of e-cigarettes from 18 to 21 in October.

Faulds claims that "even though e-cigarettes are unsafe, Juul heavily promoted its products to young people. Following the wildly successful playbook laid out in historic cigarette industry documents, defendants leveraged social media and utilized other marketing and promotion tactics, long outlawed for cigarette companies, to capture the highly lucrative youth market."

The lawsuit adds: "Juul preyed on youth using media and themes that exploit young persons' vulnerabilities to create and sustain nicotine addiction, all for financial gain, and without giving warnings about the serious risks of addiction, seizures, cardiovascular and brain injuries, and other permanent injuries."

The family is represented by Curt Marshall and Ellen Relkin of Weitz & Luxenberg in New York. "It's a terrible situation," Relkin said. "A 15-year-old boy wound up in a hospital with a frightening seizure and again had a seizure in a school locker room. The FDA has warned about seizures associated with a E-cigarette use."

Related stories:

Connecticut Man Sues Juul Labs Over Nicotine-Induced Anxiety From E-Cigarettes

Connecticut AG Investigates Juul Over Alleged Smoking-Cessation Claims Using E-Cigarettes