E-cigarettes are under fire for being a possible gateway to a life of crime and crippling addiction to hard drugs in one of the most lurid attacks on the products yet.

“E-cigs can easily become a gateway to trying and developing an addiction to more serious drugs,” warns Sudip Bose, a physician, in an article for the Huffington Post. “Addiction correlates to crime. People need to feed their habit, they break into homes to steal things to resell, they commit robberies on the streets, all to get money to feed their addiction.”