Facing a breaking campaign scandal and the typical overflowing to-do list of any big city leader, New York City Mayor Eric Adams decided Monday to take a break from reality and tackle the issue of flavored vaping products.
At a podium flanked by members of Parents Against Vaping (PAVE), Adams and the city’s corporation counsel announced New York City has filed a lawsuit in federal court charging four vape product distributors and six associated individuals with illegally selling flavored vaping products in New York.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, accuses the defendants of violating “nearly every federal, New York State and New York City law applicable to the marketing, distribution, and sale of flavored ecigarettes, the sales of which are prohibited under laws enacted by all three jurisdictions.”
The lawsuit accuses the companies and individual defendants with mail and wire fraud, and violations of New York City’s Administrative Code, New York State Public Health Law, and the federal Tobacco Control Act. The city says the four companies violated both the federal Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act and the Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking (PACT) Act.
The city says it “seeks to recover monetary damages and civil penalties from the defendants, potentially totaling millions,” according to a hyperbolic press release full of factual errors (for example, the FDA did not “ban flavored vape products” in 2020). The lawsuit announces that the city will seek triple the damages awarded at trial under the RICO law.
The companies named in the lawsuit are all located in New York State:
·Magellan Technology Inc. – Buffalo
·Ecto World LLC (which does business as Demand Vape) – Buffalo
·Mahant Krupa 56 LLC (Empire Vape Distributors) – Queens
·Star Vape Corp. – Brooklyn
Also named were six officers or employees of the companies: Matthew Glauser, Donald Hashagen, and Russell Rogers (Magellan/Demand); Nikunj Patel and Devang Koya (Empire); and Nabil Hassen (Star Vape).
The lawsuit was announced Monday afternoon—the first weekday after news broke last Friday about supporters of Mayor Adams charged with conspiring to funnel illegal campaign contributions to Adams’ 2021 mayoral campaign. Adams himself has not been accused of wrongdoing, but Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said the contributions were probably intended to gain influence at City Hall.