Suit Seeking to Stop UC Tobacco Foe Is Dismissed

A Sacramento County judge has thrown out a lawsuit against the University of California relating to the work of a UC San Francisco professor who is one of the most vocal critics of the tobacco industry in the United States.

Superior Court Judge Joe Gray said there were no grounds for the case, filed by Californians for Scientific Integrity, a group linked with the tobacco industry-funded National Smokers Alliance.

The suit alleged that Stanton A. Glantz, a professor of medicine at UC San Francisco and a member of the university’s Institute for Health Policy Studies, used public funds to conduct politically motivated research on tobacco.

Glantz is co-author of “The Cigarette Papers,” a 1995 book based on 4,000 internal Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. documents that were stolen and leaked to him and other industry foes. The papers contain material showing that the nation’s third-largest cigarette manufacturer failed to reveal information about the hazards of smoking and that company lawyers took steps to prevent the material from coming to light. Those documents now play a key role in major lawsuits against the industry.

The Scientific Integrity group alleged that public funds were misused to support Glantz’s 1994 study that said that banning smoking in restaurants has no negative effect on their business. The organization also contended that Glantz skewed data in the study, but he was not named as a defendant.

In late November, Gray granted the university’s demurrer to the complaint--without leave to amend. A demurrer is a legal term meaning that even if the plaintiff proved everything he alleged, there still is no basis for a claim against the defendant.

UC lawyer Christopher Patti praised Gray’s decision in a university statement announcing the ruling Monday.

Patti had argued to the judge that the lawsuit was designed to intimidate tobacco opponents.

“The true agenda of this action was patently obvious--to muzzle scientists whose research publications and speech on subjects relating to tobacco, tobacco control and the politics of tobacco have been a thorn in the side of the tobacco industry for decades,” he said in a brief that led to the dismissal.

“The danger of this type of lawsuit cannot be overestimated. It is an obvious attempt to intimidate and silence a bothersome critic of a wealthy and powerful industry. . . . The University of California should be a place where such controversial figures, whatever their views, may research, publish and speak, free from intimidation and harassment of the type this lawsuit represents.”

Glantz praised the university for taking a firm position on the case. “The university’s vigorous defense of our freedom to do research and disseminate the results to the public and policymakers despite opposition from powerful interests like the tobacco industry demonstrates what a great public institution the University of California is.”

Jeffery Speich, the Sacramento attorney who represents the plaintiffs, said Gray’s ruling will be appealed.

“The issue raised by this case--whether or not legislative lobbying by the University of California is constitutional--will be decided by the appellate courts of this state,” Speich said.

Glantz contends that the suit was the latest industry attempt to make trouble for a nettlesome and outspoken foe. Earlier this year, the National Smokers Alliance, whose primary funding comes from the cigarette industry, petitioned the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration seeking to cancel Glantz’s consulting contract with the agency.

In November, Glantz and his co-researcher, Lisa R. Smith, published an expanded version of their 1994 study in the American Journal of Public Health, concluding that restaurants and bars did not lose money as a result of smoking bans. The new study was accompanied by a strongly worded editorial by Mervyn Susser, the journal’s editor, defending Glantz’s research and lambasting his critics.

The Smokers’ Alliance leveled an attack on the second study as well, alleging that it contained “myriad factual errors and misrepresentations.”

California law has prohibited smoking in restaurants since 1996. As of Jan. 1, all California bars are supposed to become smoke-free as well.