The trial of San Francisco’s public school system against Altria Group began on Monday, with Thomas Cartmell, a lawyer for the San Francisco Unified School District, stating to jurors, “This case is about Altria, the largest cigarette company in our country, who helped hook a whole new generation of our young people on nicotine, causing a vaping crisis, a youth epidemic,” reports Reuters.
Beth Wilkinson, a lawyer for Altria, told the jury in her opening statement that the company had aimed to boost sales among cigarette smokers seeking a less harmful option, not among teens. “You can’t forget about those smokers,” she said. “If you can get smokers away from cigarettes, it’s a worthy cause.”
The school district also sued Juul, which settled that lawsuit last year. Cartmell told jurors that Altria, which was Juul’s largest investor from 2018 until earlier this year, when it exchanged its stake for a license to certain Juul intellectual properties, was “at the heart” of Juul’s strategy to grow its business by appealing to teenagers with sweet flavors and flashy advertising.
According to Cartmell, Altria made its large investment in Juul after being unsuccessful with its own e-cigarette, and the company knew Juul’s success was driven by youth usage, according to Bloomberg. Juul’s device was “marketed to appeal to the young, cool, popular crowd” and was “packed with nicotine,” Cartmell said.
Wilkinson argued that evidence would not support this. Juul sales fell after Altria’s investment, and Altria’s investment occurred after Juul pulled most of its flavored products off the market, according to Wilkinson, reports Law.com.
The San Francisco schools’ lawsuit was chosen to go to trial as a test case.