Gwynn’s family wants tobacco companies held accountable

Tony Gwynn’s adult children said Tuesday, one day after they filed a lawsuit against makers of smokeless tobacco that blames the product for causing his death from cancer in 2014, that they wanted the industry to be held accountable.

In a brief news appearance at the Bankers Hill offices of their lawyer, David S. Casey Jr., daughter Anisha Gwynn-Jones and son Tony Gwynn Jr. issued statements about the lawsuit filed Monday in San Diego Superior Court against the Altria Group, one of the largest tobacco companies in the world.

A spokesman for Altria did not respond to a request for comment on the suit.

The lawsuit claims the company’s smokeless tobacco products, or “dip”, caused the cancer that killed Gwynn. The suit says he started using dip and got addicted as a college athlete in 1977, before tins of the product carried warning labels but years after the suit says the producers knew the product was carcinogenic.

“Our dad was an elite athlete who didn’t drink or smoke because he cared about his health and performance,” Tony Gwynn Jr. said. “If he had know how addictive and harmful to his health dip was, he would not have started using it in college, become addicted, and died so young.”

The lawsuit said that for 31 years Gwynn consumed 1 and a half to two tins of smokeless tobacco a day, the equivalent of four to five packs of cigarettes. The suit says internal industry documents show a calculated marketing effort to appeal to youth and African-American males, despite knowing the dangers of the product.

“He wouldn’t want to see another player, or any other person, have to get sick and die because of what these tobacco companies did,” Gwynn-Jones said. “And in order to make that happen these companies have to be held accountable.”

The two did not take any questions from the media.

Gwynn was an eight times batting champion, Gold Glove winning outfielder and baseball Hall of Fame member. He’s regarded as one of the greatest hitters in the history of the game, and San Diego’s best known professional athlete.