Attorneys General, Regulators And Grieving Families Keep Filing The Same Allegation: It Was Sold As Kratom

Four state enforcement actions, a federal warning-letter campaign and at least two wrongful-death suits have been brought over kratom-labeled products since mid-2025. They were filed in different states, under different statutes, by different kinds of plaintiff. Read together, most of them turn on one claim: that what was on the shelf was not what the label said.

Texas: 86 To 96 Percent Against A 2 Percent Cap

Texas has brought at least two of these cases. The Texas Kratom Consumer Health and Safety Protection Act, enacted in 2023, limits 7-OH to 2 percent of a kratom product's total alkaloid content and prohibits synthetic additives.

Attorney General Ken Paxton sued the retailer Smokey's Paradise, of Midlothian, on February 9, alleging products containing 86 to 96 percent 7-hydroxymitragynine. "Kratom is addictive and deadly, and I'm suing these companies for knowingly endangering Texans by selling products with nearly 50 times the legal limit of this opioid," Paxton said. The state brought that case under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act and related statutes, and later secured a temporary injunction that its office says stopped the businesses from selling the products.

On April 21 the office filed against two California-based online retailers, Pure Leaf Kratom, LLC and Outcast Distribution, LLC, over products it says were shipped to Texans at up to 96 percent 7-OH. That second case carries the sharpest version of the allegation running through all of these filings. The defendants' own website, the office states, "claims they do not ship synthetic kratom products or products containing more than 2% 7-OH to Texas" — and "the investigation determined those representations are false." Laboratory testing "confirmed that multiple products sold and shipped into Texas contained 7-OH levels ranging from 86% to 96% of total alkaloid content."

"I will not allow California-based companies to illegally ship their potentially deadly substances into Texas," Paxton said. His office describes 7-OH as "a potent alkaloid more than twenty times stronger than morphine," a characterization attributed here to the office rather than adopted by this publication.

The deceptive-trade framing is the point in both suits: the claim is not only that the concentration was unlawful, but that the buyer was told otherwise.

Missouri: From Investigation To Suit

Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway opened an investigation on November 20, 2025 into six kratom manufacturers and retailers, among them MNG 2005 d/b/a CBD Kratom, Emporium Smoke Shop, Moonlight Smoke Shop, CBD American Shaman and Shaman Botanicals. Her stated concern was categorical. "We are deeply concerned that Missourians are being sold drug-like substances under the guise of harmless supplements, with no FDA approval, no safety testing, and in some cases no meaningful disclosure of what these products actually contain," she said.

The office's announcement noted that products often contained 7-hydroxymitragynine at levels "far exceeding what occurs naturally in the plant."

On March 31, 2026, Hanaway filed suit against CBD American Shaman and connected companies. The complaint's marketing allegations are the familiar ones: that labels downplayed addiction risk and omitted overdose danger, that free samples were advertised without disclosure, and that products were presented as "natural" alternatives to other opioids. "Missourians, including those struggling with opioid addiction, are being dangerously misled into believing that 7-OH is predictable, safe, and natural," Hanaway said. The state sought a declaration that the practices violate the Missouri Merchandising Practices Act, an injunction, and civil penalties of $1,000 per violation.

Florida: A Rule Written Around A Ratio

Florida took the regulatory route rather than the courtroom. Attorney General James Uthmeier signed an emergency measure on June 23 extending the state's restrictions, after announcing it at Tampa General Hospital the previous day. As reported by WUSF, the rule bars products containing more than 1 milligram of the specified compounds per gram or milliliter, and requires any product containing 7-OH or related compounds to contain at least 100 times more mitragynine by mass.

That second clause is the structurally interesting one. Rather than setting a ceiling alone, it writes the leaf's own alkaloid ratio into law — an approach that targets the inversion the products represent rather than a single number. Uthmeier said the intent was to keep pace with reformulation: "We are going to make sure that new chemical compounds that are being used to blend or substitute 7-OH derivatives will be included."

Cory Howard, an emergency physician at Tampa General Hospital, told the press conference that "in the first four months of 2026, Florida Poison Control has already received 95 cases."

The Private Suits — And An Important Distinction

Two wrongful-death suits have been filed in Jackson County Circuit Court in Missouri, and they are not the same kind of case.

The first, filed March 6 and reported by KCTV5 on March 9, was brought by Ed Thacker over the death of his son David Thacker on May 31, 2025. The autopsy attributed the death to mitragynine intoxication, with blood levels reported at 1,400 nanograms per milliliter. Defendants include The Hub Smoke Shop, Wellness Connect, Club 13, Remarkable Herbs and Olistica Life Sciences. The complaint's allegations are about labeling and representations: that product was sold in "unmarked bags with no warnings or labeling of any kind," and that employees told customers "a person cannot overdose on kratom."

That finding names mitragynine, the leaf's primary alkaloid, rather than concentrated 7-OH — and it is worth separating from the 7-OH cases rather than filing every kratom-related death under one heading. But the separation should be held loosely. The FDA's own scientific assessment of 7-OH cautions that "many forensic laboratories test for mitragynine as a marker of kratom use," and that in those cases "7-OH overdose cases and fatalities may incorrectly be classified as kratom and/or mitragynine-related." A toxicology result naming mitragynine establishes what the laboratory measured. It does not by itself establish which product the decedent bought. This publication examines that measurement problem separately.

The second suit, filed July 13 and reported by KCTV5 on July 15, is a 7-OH case. Brought by the brother of Joshua Bradley, who died March 8, 2026 of what the suit describes as the toxic effects of 7-OH, it names Bear Stop Convenience along with unnamed stores and manufacturers, and centers on a product sold as SEDA 7-Hydroxy Blend Grape Crush under the marketing phrase "sink into serenity." The complaint's theory is that "a reasonable consumer would have no reason to believe such a product could cause addiction, withdrawal or death."

The Federal Layer

Federal action predates most of the state filings. On July 15, 2025 the FDA announced seven warning letters to firms marketing 7-OH products, describing goods "sold online and in smoke shops, gas stations, and corner stores," some of them "unapproved new drugs with unproven claims such as relieving pain and managing anxiety." The FDA has since seized product and published a consumer advisory recommending that consumers avoid 7-OH products entirely.

The DEA's temporary scheduling proceeding, Docket No. DEA-1570, opened July 6 and proposes a Schedule I threshold at more than 0.050 percent 7-OH on a dry weight basis, or more than 1.00 milligram per article for processed and synthetic material. As this publication reported, the comment window closed July 31 and the order could not issue before August 5. It had not issued as of this publication.

What The Pattern Shows — And What It Does Not

The common thread across the Texas, Missouri and Florida actions and the Bradley suit is a consumer-protection theory rather than a pharmacological one. Each rests on the claim that a buyer was told one thing and sold another: a concentration above a statutory cap, a synthetic derivative described as a botanical, an opioid-acting compound presented as a supplement. That is why these cases are being brought under deceptive-trade and merchandising-practices statutes rather than drug laws alone.

Three limits are worth stating. These are allegations; none of the civil defendants named here has been found liable, and the companies are entitled to contest the claims. The Thacker case shows the category is not uniform. And a threshold or a labeling rule is a legal instrument, not a safety verdict — the FDA's own consumer material notes that the agency "has also warned consumers not to use kratom because of the risk of serious adverse events, including liver toxicity, seizures and substance use disorder."

The Kratom Council takes no position on the pharmacology and has not evaluated the underlying claims. What the docket record supports is narrower: across four jurisdictions and two years, the enforcement question has increasingly not been whether kratom should be sold, but whether the thing in the package was ever kratom at all.