Legal battle over Juul lawsuit brewing
Juul is set to face its first direct lawsuit over the death of an 18-year-old man who was found unresponsive by his mother following a three-year Juul addiction.
According to Fox News senior judicial analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano, things are about to become tenser.
"[The case] is going to be a shouting match, as lawyers say, between experts, between the plaintiff’s physicians and psychiatrists and the defendant’s physicians and psychiatrists as to whether or not Juul actually caused or precipitated the death,” Napolitano told FOX Business’ Maria Bartiromo on Wednesday.
Also being taken into account, in this case, are other ailments that may have been present in the young victim and whether Juul could have caused them.
"[If] Juul found someone or this someone found Juul who was predisposed to these lung ailments, that does not relieve Juul of the responsibility for his death,” Napolitano said.
This case comes on the heels of an injunction issued in Michigan where a judge blocked the state’s ban of flavored e-cigarettes.
To arrive at this decision, Napolitano explained, the judge would have had to “perform a qualitative judgment” assessing whether “it is more likely than not that this person will win the litigation or lose the litigation.” In this instance, the judge concluded that Juul would have one litigation if brought to trial, leading to his injunction against Michigan’s ban.
In this determination, “a preliminary review of the documents persuaded the judge—no trial, just a review of the documents—that more people’s lives were saved by Juul by weaning them off smoking than were harmed by Juul by addicting young people” Napolitano said.