Tobacco Executive Grilled on Company Smoking Memos
Philip Morris Chairman Geoffrey C. Bible, continuing his testimony Tuesday in a big tobacco trial here, was confronted with a blizzard of internal company memos concerning the narcotic effects of smoking, including one document that compared nicotine to morphine and cocaine, and described cigarettes as “nicotine delivery devices” along with nicotine patches and gum.
After being grilled a second day, the head of the world’s biggest tobacco company will return to the stand today in Minnesota’s landmark anti-tobacco case, in which the state and Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Minnesota are seeking $1.77 billion in costs for treating sick smokers, along with damages for alleged violations of state consumer protection and antitrust laws.
The lawsuit, similar to nearly 40 other state cases pending throughout the country, claims cigarette makers lied for decades about the risks and addictive qualities of smoking, causing more people to smoke and get sick than otherwise would have. The industry has denied the allegations.
Interrogating Bible about one document after another, the state’s lead attorney, Michael Ciresi, repeatedly asked the Australian-born executive to admit that since the 1960s Philip Morris Cos. had concealed what it knew about the addictiveness of smoking.
Bible, 60, and himself a smoker, remained unflappable, rarely arguing with Ciresi but often saying he was unfamiliar with the subject or context of the memos.
Cigarette makers, embarrassed by an avalanche of once-secret documents on the habituating power of nicotine, have softened their hard-line stance that smoking is not addictive. Typical are recent nuanced statements before Congress by Bible that nicotine has “mild” pharmacological effects and may be considered addictive under some definitions of the term.
But in barbed questioning Tuesday that lasted six hours, Ciresi tried to show that Bible, at best, had understated the case. And he suggested that Bible had misled Congress when he testified last month that the addition of ammonia to the company’s brands is not meant to boost their nicotine kick.
One memo presented in court was related to a new cigarette-like product called Accord that Philip Morris currently is testing with consumers. Accord would heat rather than burn tobacco, delivering nicotine to consumers but eliminating nearly all of the tar and second-hand smoke, along with the risk of cigarette fires.
The memo said “the primary reason” people smoke “is to deliver nicotine to their bodies.” It described nicotine as “similar” to such substances as cocaine and morphine.
Entitled “Competitive Analysis,” the memo said that “innovative nicotine delivery systems” produced by tobacco companies or pharmaceutical firms could soon “replace or transform the worldwide cigarette business as we know it.” A table headed “nicotine delivery device” listed cigarettes and other tobacco products along with nicotine patches and gum. The memo was undated but was of recent vintage as it cited data from 1992.
Bible dismissed the memo’s author, Barbara Reuter, as a nonscientist. “Frankly, I don’t believe we hook smokers,” he said.
Ciresi also questioned Bible about other Philip Morris documents, including:
* A 1969 memo that asked: “Do we really want to tout cigarette smoke as a drug? It is, of course, but there are dangerous . . . implications to having such conceptualization go beyond these walls.”
* A 1969 report to the firm’s board of directors by former research director Helmut Wakeham. “The cigarette will even preempt food in times of scarcity on the smoker’s priority list,” the report said.
“Does that ring a little bell that that might be addiction?” Ciresi asked.
“Not to me, sir,” Bible said.
Ciresi also revealed an apparent inconsistency between Bible’s testimony before a House committee Jan. 29 and a company document.
In his appearance before Congress, Bible was asked if the addition of ammonia to Philip Morris cigarettes is meant to increase the pH of the smoke, thus raising the proportion of “free” nicotine--a form of the compound more quickly sent to the brain. Bible responded that “the ammonia compounds” used by the firm do “not change the form of the nicotine that goes to the brain.”
By contrast, Ciresi said, a 1994 memo to Philip Morris from its European lab known as INBIFO said that “higher pHs” of tobacco result in more of the nicotine being converted to its “more physiologically effective form,” or free nicotine.
Outside the courthouse late Tuesday, Ciresi said Bible’s testimony suggested he was inadequately briefed before his congressional appearance or “he didn’t tell the truth. . . . I guess the third option is he was told and he forgot.”
Peter Bleakley, a Philip Morris lawyer, said Bible’s testimony had been accurate, as will become “absolutely clear” when the defense calls its witnesses.
As he had previously done with James Morgan, former head of Philip Morris’ domestic tobacco operations, Ciresi showed Bible documents disclosing that company officials in the 1960s and ‘70s had monitored the smoking habits of kids as young as 12.
Each time, Ciresi mockingly asked if the document was “an anomaly,” the word Morgan had used for the memos he was shown.
“If we keep seeing more anomalies, pretty soon it becomes usual, doesn’t it?” Ciresi said.
Bible said he was “ashamed” of the memos on youth smoking, but insisted the company doesn’t target customers under 18 and “under my watch” never will.
