U.S. Wins Delay in Civil Lawsuit Against Tobacco Industry Advisor

Pressing ahead with a criminal investigation of the tobacco industry, Justice Department lawyers Thursday won a delay in a civil suit that charges a leading industry consultant with defrauding federal agencies in an attempt to deflect concern about second-hand smoke.

U.S. District Judge William B. Bryant ordered a six-month delay in the trial of Healthy Buildings International, a Fairfax, Va., indoor air quality firm, after prosecutors argued that the trial would conflict with the work of a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Va, one of five grand juries investigating tobacco companies, their affiliates, or consultants.

The civil fraud suit, filed by a former HBI employee and originally scheduled for trial next week, alleges that HBI was “virtually a front” for tobacco companies and that it rigged air tests in government and private buildings to exonerate tobacco smoke as a cause of indoor pollution.

Bryant delayed the civil trial over vigorous objections from HBI attorney Marc F. Efron, who said the company is innocent and eager to have its day in court. Otherwise HBI, which has been the subject of extensive news reports, will continue to suffer adverse publicity and “face the certainty of a slow death by rumor,” Efron said.

The grand jury in Alexandria opened its investigation last year after a House subcommittee turned up what it called “a widespread pattern of significant data alteration” in HBI’s reports of indoor air tests--including a major study presented to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

HBI received a grand jury subpoena last September and subsequently turned over records. But Efron told The Times recently that HBI “was told they were not the target of the investigation.” Justice Department officials declined comment.

HBI’s extensive ties to the cigarette makers were first disclosed by The Times in February, 1992.

Starting in the mid-1980s, cigarette manufacturers provided the company with millions of dollars in contracts and subsidies, transforming a tiny firm into a giant in its field and enlisting its aid in their global war against smoking bans.

With public relations and travel expenses paid by the industry, HBI officials, including the firm’s president, Gray Robertson, made nationwide media tours and became much quoted authorities on “sick building syndrome,” in which dust, gases and bacteria in weather-tight buildings make occupants sick.

In scores of interviews and testimony before legislative bodies considering smoking bans, HBI officials maintained that tobacco smoke is an overrated problem and that, as the most visible contaminant, it is a useful marker of poor ventilation.

Philip Morris Cos. annually spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to produce Healthy Buildings International Magazine, a glossy house organ that was translated into eight languages and distributed worldwide to disseminate the firm’s views on indoor air issues--but without mentioning Philip Morris’ involvement.

The business affairs of Healthy Buildings and the tobacco industry became so entwined that the Tobacco Institute, the industry lobby group, paid $8,000 a month to open a regional office of the firm near Boston.

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In court papers, HBI has acknowledged all these financial ties to the industry. But the company has denied that the relationship was clandestine--saying it disclosed its role as an industry consultant on some occasions.

Furthermore, the company says that contrary to claims in the whistle-blower suit, it never falsified test data from building inspections that it performed for the General Services Administration, Social Security Administration, the U.S. Supreme Court and other federal clients.

The issue is not whether HBI worked for tobacco companies but “whether or not HBI did honest building inspections,” Efron said.

However, a report by the U.S. House of Representatives’ health and environment subcommittee in December, 1994, lent support to the claim of data falsification.

The report cited statements to the panel by former HBI employees Reginald Simmons and Gregory Wulchin, who said company higher-ups frequently changed data and conclusions in their building inspection reports.

Moreover, the panel said it managed on its own to uncover “a widespread pattern of significant data alteration” in a major study by HBI that summarized the results of 585 building inspections. The HBI study was prepared for the Center for Indoor Air Research, an organization funded by the tobacco industry, and submitted to the EPA.