Parents sue Paqui and Hershey over death of teenager after ‘One Chip Challenge’

“No,” he is said to have replied, “it was the chip.”

That morning, Harris had eaten a Paqui “One Chip Challenge” product, a single tortilla chip packaged in a coffin-shaped box and coated in powder made from the world’s hottest chili peppers, the lawsuit says. Hours after his hospital room visit, Harris died.

The wrongful death lawsuit filed by his parents accuses Paqui and his parent companies — Amplify Snack Brands and Hershey Co. — of manufacturing a dangerously spicy product and aggressively marketing it to children through a viral social media campaign. In the lawsuit filed in Suffolk County Superior Court, Lois and Amos Wolobah also accuse Walgreens, the retailer that sold the chips, of making the product easily accessible to children.

Paqui, Amplify and Hershey did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Washington Post on Thursday. Walgreens declined to comment on the Wolobahs’ allegations.

Douglas Sheff, a lawyer for the Wolobahs, said the chips were so dangerous that no one should have eaten them.

“This product should never have been available to adults, let alone children. It should never have been on the shelves,” Sheff said at a news conference on Thursday. “What are they doing? They kept pushing it – until poor Harris died.”

In advertising the product, Paqui boasted that last year’s One Chip Challenge chips were coated in seasoning from “two of the hottest chili varieties available today,” the Carolina Reaper and the Naga Viper. Both varieties have been ranked as the hottest chili varieties in the world at different times, according to Guinness World Records, and the Carolina Reaper and Naga Viper can each reach about 2.2 million and 1.3 million Scoville units, respectively, dwarfing the 2,500 to 8,000 units of the jalapeño.

Harris’ boyfriend purchased the One Chip Challenge product on Aug. 31 at a Walgreens store in her town of Worcester, Massachusetts, the lawsuit says. The next morning, the boyfriend brought several chips to school, where Harris and several other students allegedly ate varying amounts of the chips together and posted videos of it on social media.

When Harris became ill, he asked his teacher for help and was taken to the hospital room in a wheelchair, the lawsuit says. School officials told his mother he was ill, and his parents picked him up and took him home, the lawsuit says.

That afternoon, Harris went to his room after becoming ill again, the lawsuit says. His mother allegedly noticed him breathing abnormally a short time later and called 911. Harris again lost consciousness and stopped breathing, the lawsuit says, and although paramedics took him to a hospital, doctors were unable to revive him.

In an interview with Boston television station WBZ in September, the Wolobahs blamed the chip for their son’s death and pushed for a ban. Less than a week after Harris’ death, Paqui pulled the One Chip Challenge chips from shelves.

A medical examiner determined in February that Harris’ death was caused by cardiac arrest “related to recent ingestion of a food high in capsaicin,” Elaine Driscoll, a spokeswoman for the Massachusetts Executive Office of Public Safety and Security, said in May when the findings attracted national attention.

The autopsy report noted that Harris had “cardiomegaly and myocardial bypass of the left anterior descending coronary artery” – an enlarged heart and a congenital heart defect, Driscoll said. But Sheff said at Thursday’s news conference that Harris would have had “a normal, healthy life with a normal life expectancy” if he had not eaten the chip.

In May, a Paqui spokeswoman said the company worked with retailers to remove the One Chip Challenge chips from shelves in September and discontinued the product.

“We were and are deeply saddened by the passing of Harris Wolobah and extend our sincere condolences to his family and friends,” spokeswoman Kim Metcalfe said at the time, adding that the challenge “was intended for adults only… the product was not intended for children or anyone sensitive to spicy foods or suffering from health conditions.”

But Paqui already knew the One Chip Challenge was dangerous, the lawsuit says, citing warnings on the product, including “Keep out of reach of children” and “Do not eat if you are sensitive to spicy foods, allergic to peppers, nightshades or capsaicin, or pregnant or have a medical condition.”

Before Harris’ death, there had been several cases in California, New Mexico and Texas in which students had eaten the chips and subsequently required medical attention.

Despite these incidents, children still had easy access to the chips, the lawsuit says. Paqui encouraged children to eat the chips by promoting the “One Chip Challenge” on TikTok and other social media sites, encouraging people to eat one chip and wait as long as possible before eating or drinking anything to ease the pain, the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit also alleges that the Walgreens store did nothing to restrict children’s access to the product. Staff did not lock the chips away or hide them on employee-only shelves, but allowed children to freely take them from shelves and purchase them, the lawsuit says.

Sheff said Harris’ parents are suing to protect other children.

“The Wolobahs want to send a message not only to Paqui and Hershey, but to anyone who would endanger our children,” he said.

Maham Javaid contributed to this report.