Cigarette makers lose ruling in Louisiana

Philip Morris USA, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. and other U.S. cigarette makers must pay part of a $591-million award to fund quit-smoking programs in Louisiana, a state appeals court ruled Wednesday.

The New Orleans court upheld part of a 2004 jury verdict that said the companies must pay for a 10-year program including nicotine gum and patches, telephone lines and regional stop-smoking centers, said Russ Herman, a New Orleans lawyer representing the smokers.

The companies can appeal to the Louisiana Supreme Court.

“On the whole, I’m very satisfied,” Herman said. It wasn’t immediately clear how much the companies will have to pay under the ruling, he said.

The decision upholds some aspects of the first jury verdict to require cigarette makers to pay to help smokers quit.

It comes after a federal judge in Washington ruled in August that the industry violated U.S. racketeering laws and must stop marketing cigarettes as “light” or “low-tar.”

John Sorrells, a spokesman for Philip Morris parent Altria Group Inc., said the company hadn’t seen the decision and declined to comment.

The Louisiana court reduced the amount the companies will have to pay and held that they would not have to pay at least $415 million in interest the smokers had claimed, Herman said.

A New Orleans jury of eight women and four men returned the underlying verdict in May 2004 after lawyers for a statewide class of smokers had asked the companies to finance smoking cessation programs for 25 years at a cost of more than $1 billion.