28-05-2025
How 'laughing gas' became a deadly - but legal
But for some, these warnings came too late.
In 2023, the family of a 25-year-old woman, Marissa Politte successfully sued Nitrous Distributor United Brands for $745m in damages after the radiology technician was killed by a driver high on nitrous oxide. The jury found the company responsible for selling the product in the knowledge that it would be misused.
"Marissa Politte's death shouldn't have happened in the first place, but my God, it should be the last," Johnny Simon, the Politte family's lawyer, said at the time. In the years since there have been several fatal traffic accidents involving the gas both in the US and the UK.
Meanwhile, Ms Caldwell's family have launched a class action lawsuit against manufacturers and distributors of nitrous oxide, hoping to remove the product from retail sales across the US for good.
"The people who administer nitrous oxide in a dentist office now have to go through hours and hours of training, she said. "It just is crazy to me that the drug can be purchased in a smoke shop to anyone who goes in."
"Unfortunately, it's become very obvious that the manufacturers and the owners of the smoke shops are not going to do the moral thing and take this off the shelves themselves," Ms Dial said.
