Legal

State

Tobacco companies win lawsuit in Miami (FL)
A Miami jury found Philip Morris not liable for the death of Annie Ingraham, a smoker who died from emphysema. Ingraham’s daughter sued Philip Morris after her mother died, but the jury decided that Ingraham was not addicted to cigarettes and therefore the tobacco company could not be held liable for her death. This case is one of thousands of Engle progeny suits, which stem from a class-action lawsuit thrown out by the Florida Supreme Court in 2006. Read more here.

Fort Myers jury favors Big Tobacco in smoking case (FL)
Philip Morris has been found not liable for a 72 year old former smoker’s negative health outcomes. The plaintiff, John Syzmanski, started smoking at age eleven and developed cancer of the larynx, lymph nodes, and tongue between 1993 and 2010. Syzmanski’s attorney argued that the tobacco company designed its products to addict young people and that Syzmanski became addicted before the first Surgeon General’s warning was available. Philip Morris argued that Syzmanski was responsible for his own decision to smoke. According to a press release from Philip Morris’s parent company Altria, this case is the company’s tenth win in its last fourteen Engle progeny lawsuits. Click here for more details.

Mistrial declared in $700 million tobacco case in St. Louis (MS)
A class-action lawsuit against Philip Morris ended in a mistrial because a jury could not come to a conclusion on whether Philip Morris deceived customers with misleading marketing of light cigarettes. The lawsuit, which sought damages ranging from $696 million to $911 million, was filed eleven years ago on behalf of Missouri smokers. The plaintiffs’ attorney states he will ask for a new trial. Read more here.

Massive West Virginia tobacco trial ends suddenly (WV)
A West Virginia class-action case involving over 700 claims that Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds and Lorillard hid the addictive nature of cigarettes has ended in a mistrial. The plaintiffs’ case hinged on a particular piece of evidence to which the defendants objected, and the plaintiffs were unable to proceed without it. If the tobacco companies had been found liable, a situation could have happened in West Virginia that would be similar to the one in Florida in which hundreds of Engle cases are being tried separately following the decertification of a large class action lawsuit. Read more here.

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National

U.S. judge blocks graphic cigarette warnings
U.S. District Judge Richard Leon has issued a preliminary injunction that will block the implementation of graphic cigarette package warnings. Under federal law, the warning labels would have been required on all cigarette packages by September 2012. Judge Leon says the warnings violate cigarette companies' First Amendment rights, but public health policy experts argue that precedent shows that the government can require strong warning labels to protect the public’s health. Tobacco companies sued the FDA in August 2010 because they felt the warning labels were a form of government-mandated “anti-smoking advocacy,” and their First Amendment rights were being violated. Because of Leon’s injunction, tobacco companies will not have to comply with the new warning label policy until their pending lawsuit is resolved. Public health advocates and officials are calling for the Court of Appeals to reverse Judge Leon’s decision, so it is currently unclear what impact Judge Leon’s decision will have on the implementation of the graphic warning label policy. In addition, senators from five states have sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Justice and the FDA to request an appeal. Learn more by clicking here. Related: Obama scolds tobacco firms for fighting new labels Just weeks after an announcement from the White House that President Obama has kicked his smoking habit, the president gave a video statement on the day of the American Cancer Society’s Great American Smokeout recognizing that quitting smoking is difficult, and expressing his distaste for the tobacco companies’ attempts to block the new graphic warning labels. Read more here.

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International

Philip Morris challenges Australia on plain pack (Australia)
Philip Morris has reacted to the Australian Parliament’s recent decision to enact plain packaging laws for tobacco products by launching legal action that could trigger compensation claims. A Philip Morris spokesperson stated that the Australian government has not demonstrated that the plain packaging would be effective at reducing smoking, and the country has ignored “serious legal issues” associated with plain packaging. Similarly, British American Tobacco (BAT) has vowed to bring a case to Australia’s top court to repeal the plain packaging law if it is enacted. Australia’s Health Minister Nicola Roxon says tobacco companies must let the government defend the health of the public. Experts predict that these legal challenges will fail, since intellectual property laws allow governments to pass laws in order to protect the public’s health. Read more about the Philip Morris lawsuit by clicking here.

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