Family of woman who died at production facility files lawsuit

The family of a woman who died after having an asthma attack at a Holyoke cannabis production facility has filed a wrongful death suit against the Florida-based company where she worked. Lorna McMurrey, 27, was grinding cannabis and filling prerolled joints in early January 2022 when she started having difficulty breathing due to the ground cannabis dust in the air, according to the complaint. For the second time in a few months, she was rushed to the hospital by ambulance; she died three days later. The company, Trulieve Cannabis Corp., and its subsidiaries and contractors, exposed workers to a hazardous work environment and didn’t take proper safety precautions, according to the lawsuit, filed Monday in Hampden County Superior Court. Truelieve, which was fined $14,500 for failing to conduct a hazard analysis, has since shut down its operations in Massachusetts. The company did not reply to a request for comment. McMurrey’s is the first death attributed to occupational asthma, according to investigations by the state Department of Public Health and the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration. “Occupational allergic diseases, including asthma, are an emerging concern in the rapidly expanding US cannabis industry,” the report notes. There was no evidence that McMurrey had asthma before she started working with cannabis in May 2021, according to the state health department. “The defendants in this burgeoning industry failed to develop and implement appropriate safety policies across its facilities throughout the United States, including its Holyoke facility,” Jeremy M. Carroll, one of the attorneys working on behalf of McMurrey’s family, said in a statement. “Had they done so, Lorna McMurrey would be alive today.”