Crime & Safety

Kane Co. Mom Sues, Accuses Tobacco Shop of Selling Son 'Dangerous' Product

Karen Dobner's attorney filed a wrongful death lawsuit against a now-shuttered shop in Aurora. Dobner said the store sold her son Max a product that led to his death after a June 14 crash in Batavia Township.

An Aurora mom's attorney this week filed a wrongful death suit against a local tobacco shop, and she is accusing them of selling her son a drug.

The suit claims the Cigar Box shop sold Karen Dobner's son Max an "unreasonably dangerous" product. The product was a type of potpourri labeled as iAroma.

Dobner confirmed with Batavia Patch that the suit was filed on Tuesday in DuPage County.

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Dobner contends that the . The artificial form of the drug is supposed to mimic actual marijuana, but .

Dobner said her son Max on June 14 purchased and smoked some of the product with a friend. Less than two hours later he reported being in a panicked state, and then he was involved in a . Max died from blunt force trauma sustained in the crash. He was 19.

Find out what's happening in Bataviawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"If somebody gets hurt or dies, you need to be held responsible and accountable," Dobner told Batavia Patch on Tuesday evening. "You have laws where you are not allowed to sell things that are dangerous to people."

The Suit: Mislabeled Products

The suit says the iAroma potpourri product sold at the Aurora store was mislabeled. The suit alleges the owner already knew, or should have known, about the effects the product could have on someone if consumed, the Daily Herald reports.

The suit names the Cigar Box owner as Ruby Mohsin of Glen Ellyn. A phone listing for Mohsin was dialed multiple times on Thursday, but did not work. Other media outlets also report being unable to reach Mohsin.

The product that Dobner's son purchased was sold in a small 1-gram package that tears open. The "flavor" of the iAroma potpourri he and his friend purchased was Hypnotic, Dobner said.

The packaging only listed two ingredients, but the lawsuit claims the product contained synthetic cannabinoids, according to the Daily Herald's story.

Synthetic cannabinoids have a , the active ingredient in marijuana, drug researchers told Patch this summer.

Dobner in August said extensive testing of her son's blood and tissue revealed the .

Dobner has repeatedly said that if her son knew how severe the potpourri's effect would be, he would not have touched it.

The Suit: Store Had No License

The wrongful death suit also claims the store did not have permission to sell their products.

"They did not have a tobacco license for years," Dobner said. "These people purchased the Cigar Box from previous owners."

Dobner said the City of Aurora does not have a recent record of anyone obtaining a tobacco license for Cigar Box. The Cigar Box was located inside the Westfield Fox Valley Shopping Mall. It closed sometime in the summer.

Batavia Patch is not certain when the store closed, but it was still open on July 24 when Patch staffers conducted an investigation into area stores who sold products likely to be synthetic marijuana. Find out what happened when Patch went into the Cigar Box . (Go to the last section in the link, titled "Still Unknown, Still Legal.")

The Cigar Box was located in the part of Aurora that's inside DuPage County boundaries.

The Discovery

Dobner said to this point she has kept her distance from the suit and the store. Now that the suit has been filed, she plans to go to DuPage County to attend court dates related to the case.

"If Max did not call his brother, we wouldn’t have found out about this," Dobner said.

Max Dobner called his older brother Justin on the afternoon of June 14 to say that he had smoked "that legal stuff" and that he was having a panic attack. His brother tried to get him to calm down, but after the call Max's behavior became erratic.

Max reportedly got into his car and drove from Aurora to Batavia Township. He was in a 1999 Chrysler Cirrus traveling eastbound on Mooseheart Road at speeds of up to 100 mph. The Cirrus and eventually crashed into a two-story home that faces the intersection, according to police.

Karen Dobner said that her older son told her about the phone call shortly after the crash. She approached Max's friend and discovered she still had the iAroma package with some of the potpourri still inside, and a receipt from the Cigar Box store. Dobner turned the items over to police.

Lt. Pat Gengler of the Kane County Sheriff's Office confirmed this summer that investigators have a receipt for this case and sent the potpourri for testing.

The Movement

Since Dobner learned about the store-bought product, she has decided to educate the public on its prevalence and possible effects.

Dobner this summer started the To The Maximus! Foundation, which is focused on education, cooperation and eradication of substances defined as synthetic marijuana.

"I don't think we have a grasp of knowing how many people are hurt or dying from this because it doesn’t show up on (drug) tests," she said.

The foundation has successfully lobbied to ban the sale and use of synthetic drugs in several area towns, including , Sugar Grove, North Aurora, , and as of Tuesday, .

Before the bans, the foundation's members picketed a and .

Dobner is discouraged that Naperville and each of the Tri Cities have not yet instituted their own ban. Instead of targeting more cities, for now she is focusing on the awareness part of her campaign.

The foundation is going to work with a team of educators to develop different versions of the drug information for specific groups, such as students or first responders.

"We plan on hitting corporate education and hitting the big gas station chains … and appealing to their sense of right and wrong," Dobner said.

On Wednesday, Dobner announced she was invited to speak Nov. 10 at an emergency summit on synthetic marijuana in Springfield, IL.

"I wasn’t able to protect my son because it’s a danger I wasn’t aware of," Dobner said. "But now with the knowledge in hand, I feel it’s my obligation to keep other parents informed."

Dobner paused.

"Max wouldn’t have it any other way."

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