Legal

National

Legal Update, March/April 2008
The latest issue of the Legal Update, the newsletter of the Tobacco Control Legal Consortium, is now available. This issue features an update of the Legal Consortium’s popular 2005 publication, There is No Constitutional Right to Smoke. The Legal Update also includes summaries of several important new court rulings in tobacco lawsuits, including challenges to smoke-free laws in Texas, Ohio, South Carolina, and Colorado; the U.S. Supreme Court case on Maine’s attempt to control the online sale of cigarettes; the decertification of a massive “light cigarette” class action lawsuit; and a New York appellate decision in the landmark Rose v. Brown & Williamson “light cigarette” case.  We provide updates on the latest states to go smoke-free, as well as an overview of attempts by several Minnesota bars to circumvent the state’s new smoke-free law by holding sham “theater nights.” Click here to view the newsletter.

State using up cash from tobacco lawsuit (IA)
Iowa may be near the end of its funds from the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement.  The settlement money was originally designated to fund anti-smoking campaigns, cancer treatment, and prevention and cessation programs.  In 2002, the state sold its rights to the settlement payments, instead taking a $500 million one-time payout.  For years, the state has used this money to patch funding deficits and cover the costs of programs unrelated to tobacco prevention. Now that the funds are depleted, there are concerns as to whether state tobacco programs can survive with no dedicated funding source once the remaining settlement money is depleted. For more information, click here.

Agency goes up in smoke:  Foundation makes last bid to keep cash (OH)
After the Ohio Tobacco Prevention Foundation sued the state to prevent nearly all of the remaining settlement money from being redirected to a job creation program, state lawmakers responded by passing a bill to eliminate the Foundation. The bill would divert $320 million of the remaining settlement money to state projects, with the last $40 million of the Foundation’s money redirected to the Ohio Department of Health. In an effort to protect its funds from being liquidated by the state, the Foundation turned over $190 million to the American Legacy Foundation in April. Click here for more details. Update: A judge will decide in early June whether the state’s bill to redirect the tobacco money violates the agreement between the Ohio foundation and American Legacy Foundation to safeguard the money. Read more here.

Judge's ruling brings down curtain on bar's smoking 'performances'
(MN)
After several bars began staging theatrical “smoking performances” to circumvent the statewide smoking ban, the Minnesota Department of Health filed a court case against one of the offenders, the Bullseye Saloon. In order to allow bar patrons to smoke, the performances were designed to exploit a loophole in the state smoking ban that allows smoking during theatrical performances. A Minnesota judge ruled that the smoking performances are not acceptable under the Minnesota Clear Air Act, and called for all smoking performances to stop. Though a similar case against another bar is pending, this first court decision has set the standard against the smoking performances. Click here to find out more.

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International

Patients lose smoking ban appeal (UK)
A high court judge ruled that mental hospital patients are subject to the national public smoking ban when living in an inpatient facility. Inpatients from Rampton, a mental facility in Nottinghamshire, England had brought the case on grounds that they were not allowed the freedom to smoke “in the privacy of their own home” as other citizens do. The judge ruled that any violation of the patients’ rights is justified by the protection from the health risks caused by smoking and secondhand smoke. In his decision, the judge also cited security concerns with patients taking outdoor smoking breaks at the facility, which houses potentially violent and dangerous patients. Click here for more details.

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