R.J. Reynolds Wins New Florida Trial

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings Inc. won a new trial in a case that had brought a $200,000 judgment against the company in favor of the family of a deceased Tampa smoker. The cigarette maker also defeated Pennsylvania smokers’ bid for class-action status in a separate case.

Florida state Judge Ralph Steinberg on Thursday threw out the $200,000 in compensatory damages the family of Suzanne Jones had been awarded in his courtroom in October. The jury had declined to award punitive damages to the family of the 62-year-old mother of one.

In his order, Steinberg said he erred in allowing the jury to see several depositions, including one from Bennett LeBow, the head of Liggett Group Inc.’s parent company. LeBow became an industry pariah in 1996 when his company became the first cigarette maker to settle a health-related lawsuit.

“The publication of these depositions to the jury appeared to be contrary to due process and fairness to both the defendants and the deponents,” Steinberg wrote. The depositions had been taken for a different tobacco case, Steinberg said.

On Oct. 26, Florida’s Supreme Court ruled that a legislative amendment allowing the depositions to be admitted was unconstitutional.

If Steinberg had known it was under consideration by the high court, “the deposition testimony would not have been admitted in evidence,” he wrote.

R.J. Reynolds said it was optimistic about the new trial and was “gratified” with the decision.

Attorneys for Jones couldn’t be reached for comment.

Separately, R.J. Reynolds said a Pennsylvania court has declined to grant class-action status to a lawsuit that had sought to represent all Pennsylvanians who purchased light or ultra-light cigarettes. The suit claimed the company misrepresented the health risks of smoking those types of cigarettes.

The court said a class action would not be feasible since it would need to look at the individual claims as to why consumers chose to smoke the light or ultra-light cigarettes, R.J. Reynolds said.

The six jurors in the Jones case, who deliberated for about a day, decided the company was negligent in making a dangerous product that caused her death. Jones, who suffered from lung and colon cancer, smoked for about 42 years.

The case in Steinberg’s Hillsborough County courtroom was the first tobacco trial in Florida since a Miami jury in July assessed $145 billion in punitive damages against the industry in a class-action lawsuit on behalf of hundreds of thousands of smokers in the state.

Shares of Winston-Salem, N.C.-based R.J. Reynolds slipped 38 cents to close at $48.75 on the New York Stock Exchange.