State Jury Clears Cigarette Makers
The tobacco industry scored a notable victory Friday when a state court jury in Sacramento absolved Philip Morris USA and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. of responsibility for the cancer of a longtime smoker. It was the industry’s first West Coast victory in a jury trial after six consecutive defeats.
By votes of 11 to 1 and 12 to 0, the Sacramento jury rejected claims by plaintiffs Laurence and Laurie Lucier, who had accused the companies of negligence, fraud and manufacturing defective products.
According to defense and plaintiffs’ lawyers, jurors were not convinced that smoking caused Laurence Lucier’s illness. The companies could not have been held liable without a finding that Lucier’s cancer was smoking-related.
Theodore Grossman, lawyer for RJR, said he was elated by the outcome of the lengthy trial, which started in late October in Sacramento County Superior Court. The jurors understood that “people who choose to smoke in the face of ... known risks should not be financially rewarded,” Grossman said.
Plaintiffs’ lawyer Gary Paul said he was disappointed for his clients but was pleased by jury statements that the companies had been guilty of misconduct. They “believed everything we said about hiding the truth, concealment and deception,” he said, but weren’t convinced that smoking caused Lucier’s cancer.
According to case evidence, Lucier, 52, smoked his first cigarette at age 7 or 8 and became a regular smoker in his early teens. For a short time in the 1960s, he smoked RJR’s Winston cigarettes, then switched to Philip Morris’ Benson & Hedges. He was found to have cancer in 1999, but the disease is in remission.
The firms disputed testimony that the cancer originated in Lucier’s lung, arguing instead that the tumor formed in the chest but outside the lung and was a rare, nonsmoking type.
Tobacco officials, while gratified by the outcome, in some cases were surprised. Based on past results, “I’d never bet against a plaintiff with a California jury,” an industry lawyer, who would not speak for attribution, said before the verdict was announced.
Before Friday, California juries had handed the industry four straight defeats after the repeal of a state ban on tobacco lawsuits in 1998. Plaintiffs also were victorious in two other cases in Oregon.
Even after trial courts trimmed the largest of the awards, damages against the companies total $363 million in the six cases, which are in various stages of appeal.
On Dec. 31, Philip Morris won a case against an individual smoker in U.S. District Court in Oakland -- though the victory came not from a jury but in a directed verdict by a federal judge. Dozens more cases are pending in the state.
Bonnie Herzog, a tobacco analyst with Salomon Smith Barney, called Friday’s result “positive news,” proving that the industry “can convince at least one jury that it is not responsible” for a smoker’s illness. However, the “track record for the industry is one win out of seven cases on the West Coast,” she said.
Also Friday, a Miami jury sided with cigarette makers in a case brought by a flight attendant over secondhand smoke.
The case was one of scores filed after a class-action settlement that set ground rules for flight attendants to pursue individual injury claims.
The jury rejected the claim of James A. Seal, who blamed smoky air in airline cabins for aggravating his asthma. Along with Philip Morris and RJR, defendants in the case were Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. and Lorillard Tobacco Co.
Shares of Altria Group Inc., parent of Philip Morris, rose 9 cents to $37.62 on the New York Stock Exchange. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings Co., parent of RJR, dipped 39 cents to $40.65, also on the NYSE.
