Ten people are arrested, and more than $1 million worth of illegal vape products are seized in a statewide multi-agency vape crackdown. Ernest Legier, the commissioner of the Louisiana Office of Alcohol and Tobacco Control, says the operation involved 64 full-time employees, including 30 agents statewide.
“We are seizing truckloads of non-compliant products because, simply, the demand and the profit incentive from these products is really, really odd,” Legier said.
Legier says in addition to the ten arrests, his office has suspended the permits of six businesses – three in Shreveport, two in Lafayette and one in Baton Rouge.
“We want the message to be very clear that if you accept a permit to sell a regulated product within the state of Louisiana, that it should be done in accordance with the law and certainly not as an enemy of public safety, which is our chief goal in this situation,” Legier said.
Legier says the products seized include 34,000 pens, pods and juices; 16,000 CBD gummies, liquids and pre-rolled cigarettes and 6,500 containers of nitrous oxide.
“We’ve had to secure another 10 off-site storage units in order to store the level of, not only illegal vape products, but illegal CPD and TAC products that we’re finding in these locations,” Legier said.
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