Lawyer Ochia told the jury that investing in Juul did not yield any benefits

Time： 2023-04-27

The lawyer for Altria Group told the jury that the company did not benefit from its $12.8 billion investment in Juul Labs Inc. in 2021, an experiment on whether...

The lawyer for Altria Group told the jury that the company did not benefit from its $12.8 billion investment in Juul Labs Inc. in 2021, an experiment on whether Altria helped Juul Labs promote sales, leading to an increase in teenage e-cigarettes.

The trial is a case brought by the San Francisco school system.

According to Bloomberg, lawyer Bess Wilkinson argued at the beginning of the trial in the Federal Court of San Francisco on Monday that Altria played a passive role in Juul's efforts to promote electronic cigarettes to young users, and did not get any money from this investment, so they did not benefit.

She said that the investment evaporated to $250 million in 2018, referring to the value of the Juul investment announced by Altria earlier this year at the end of 2022, when the company exchanged the investment for the right to heat tobacco product technology.

Lawyers representing the San Francisco United School District told US District Judge William Orrick that Wilkinson's statement to the jury regarding Juul's investment was biased against the plaintiff and violated the basic rule of excluding certain information in the trial.

The judge stated that he will handle objections before resuming the trial on Tuesday morning.

The trial forced Othia to publicly defend itself for the first time as it faced thousands of cases against the company and Juul. Last December, Juul Labs agreed to pay over $1.2 billion to settle more than 5000 lawsuits accusing the company of causing the popularity of e-cigarettes among teenagers in the United States.

Thomas Cartwell, a lawyer representing the school district, told jurors that Altria would say that we did not promote the product. He said, 'This is true, but it is very important for you to understand everything that Ochia knows when pursuing and collaborating with Juul.'. He added that Ochia knows that Juul's marketing strategy will attract and attract young people, including children.

Cartwell said that after investing in Altria in 2018, Juul's sales soared, and the tobacco company helped the startup market its products and opened 10000 new stores. He said that Altria knew that Juul's plan to increase sales would defeat the efforts of the US Food and Drug Administration to curb the use of e-cigarettes by teenagers.

According to a recent court document, in addition to the proposed class action lawsuit, the massive litigation in the San Francisco Federal Court includes approximately 4270 personal injury lawsuits and over 1434 complaints filed by government entities and Native American tribes.

Juul and Altria defended the first trial that began in March, which was initiated by Minnesota and involved fraudulent marketing of e-cigarettes. These companies resolved the case in the state last month, but details have not yet been disclosed.

In April, Juul agreed to pay $462 million to six states and the District of Columbia to resolve lawsuits and investigations targeting the sale of addictive e-cigarette products to children.

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