{"id":2542,"date":"2014-10-24T21:18:04","date_gmt":"2014-10-24T21:18:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=2542"},"modified":"2014-10-26T05:23:05","modified_gmt":"2014-10-26T05:23:05","slug":"philip-morris-r-j-reynolds-lose-another-41-million-settlement-this-one-for-giving-a-person-copd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=2542","title":{"rendered":"Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds lose another $41 million settlement, this one for giving a person COPD"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"camel\"<\/a>Tobacco giants Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds lost another major settlement this week<\/a>\u00a0in Florida.<\/p>\n

This case is one of the thousands of Engle cases winding their way through the Florida courts. R.J. Reynolds will<\/em> appeal this verdict (oh, yes they will) but several of these verdicts have been upheld by appeals courts.<\/a><\/p>\n

The Engle cases stem from a huge $145 billion class-action judgemen<\/a>t in 2000. In 2006, the Florida Supreme Court overturned that settlement, but made an important decision to allow individual lawsuits against tobacco companies. Since then, several thousand lawsuits have been filed against tobacco companies, primarily Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds and Lorrilard, and judgements ranging between a few million to $23.6 billion have been handed down by juries (I believe that $23.6 billion judgement will get tossed on appeal as excessive … when I Googled it, Google asked me “do you mean $23.6 million<\/em>?”).<\/p>\n

According to the article:<\/p>\n

Attorney Kenneth Byrd of the Nashville office of national plaintiffs’ law firm Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP, announced that a jury in federal court in Florida today returned a verdict of $41.1 million against Philip Morris USA Inc. and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company for conspiring for decades to conceal the hazards of smoking and the addictive nature of cigarettes. The jury award consists of $15.8 million in compensatory damages and punitive damages in the amounts of $15.7 million against Philip Morris and $9.6 million against R.J. Reynolds.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe cigarette industry argues that as Engle class members and their spouses die, their lawsuits die with them. We will continue working night and day to see that these class members get their day in Court.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Interesting that was in federal court, I’m positive other Florida cases were in state courts.<\/p>\n

This case is also a little unusual because most of these Engle cases at this point are being filed by relatives of people who died from lung cancer. This one was filed by the smoker, who is still alive and is suffering from COPD, not lung cancer. I believe that’s the first major judgement I’ve seen against a tobacco company for its role in giving a person COPD. I’m sure there’s been some, I just don’t remember ever coming across a story about it until now.<\/p>\n

According to the article:<\/p>\n

“At trial Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds sought to place all the blame on Mr. Kerrivan for becoming addicted to nicotine as a teenager in a time when the defendants widely marketed smoking cigarettes using celebrities and famous athletes and advertised on television shows popular with children and teenagers. Thankfully, the jury rejected this defense and held Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds accountable for their decision to target an entire generation of post-World War II American teenagers with a lifetime addiction to nicotine,” stated Mr. Byrd. \u201cThe cigarette industry argues that as Engle class members and their spouses die, their lawsuits die with them. We will continue working night and day to see that these class members get their day in Court.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tobacco giants Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds lost another major settlement this week\u00a0in Florida. This case is one of the thousands of Engle cases winding their way through the Florida courts. R.J. Reynolds will appeal this verdict (oh, yes they will) but several of these verdicts have been upheld by appeals courts. The Engle cases … Continue reading Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds lose another $41 million settlement, this one for giving a person COPD<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2543,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[19,24,311,49,55],"tags":[594,666,608,168],"class_list":["post-2542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-copd","category-engle-case","category-florida","category-philip-morris","category-rj-reynolds","tag-engle-case","tag-florida","tag-philip-morris","tag-r-j-reynolds"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/florida-supreme-court.jpg?fit=238%2C212&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4hpEa-F0","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2286,"url":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=2286","url_meta":{"origin":2542,"position":0},"title":"U.S. Supreme Court leaves Florida jury awards intact in Engle cases — this is a big deal","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"June 10, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"This is a continuation of the long-running Engle case in Florida. Many years ago, a jury issued a $145 billion class action judgement against Big Tobacco for knowingly selling a toxic, addictive product to people, and then lying about it. This came to be known as the Engle case ($110\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Engle case"","block_context":{"text":"Engle case","link":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?cat=24"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Howard_Engle.jpg?fit=600%2C369&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Howard_Engle.jpg?fit=600%2C369&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Howard_Engle.jpg?fit=600%2C369&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2365,"url":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=2365","url_meta":{"origin":2542,"position":1},"title":"RJ Reynolds loses $23.6 billion jury judgement","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"July 20, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Wow, this is a big \"wow.\" A big wow that will likely get reduced upon appeal. In one of the thousands of Engle liability cases in Florida, a jury awarded a settlement of $23.6 billion (yeah, billion) in favor of one of the 8,000 Engle plaintiffs. (The Engle decision was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Engle case"","block_context":{"text":"Engle case","link":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?cat=24"},"img":{"alt_text":"Cigarettes-burning-via-AFP-615x345","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/Cigarettes-burning-via-AFP-615x345-300x168.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2967,"url":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=2967","url_meta":{"origin":2542,"position":2},"title":"Breaking: Big Tobacco companies agree to $100 million settlement of Engle cases","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"February 25, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 Breaking news! RJ Reynolds, Lorillard and Philip Morris have reached a $100 million settlement of 400 \u00a0Engle cases in Florida. I thought they might do this. I've been writing for months that, every way I cut it, it was in their interest to do this. The Engle (named after\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Engle case"","block_context":{"text":"Engle case","link":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?cat=24"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/Howard-Engle.jpg?fit=600%2C369&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/Howard-Engle.jpg?fit=600%2C369&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/Howard-Engle.jpg?fit=600%2C369&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1157,"url":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=1157","url_meta":{"origin":2542,"position":3},"title":"R.J. Reynolds quietly loses $37.5 million judgement","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"August 4, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"This story didn't get as much attention as I would've have expected, I think because it's actually becoming routine. A jury last week awarded a family who lost their wife and mother to lung cancer in 1995 after years of smoking a $37.5 award from R.J. Reynolds. This judgement is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Engle case"","block_context":{"text":"Engle case","link":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?cat=24"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/r-GROSSMAN-large570.jpg?fit=570%2C238&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/r-GROSSMAN-large570.jpg?fit=570%2C238&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/r-GROSSMAN-large570.jpg?fit=570%2C238&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2878,"url":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=2878","url_meta":{"origin":2542,"position":4},"title":"Another Engle Case judgement — $17.3 million against Philip Morris","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"January 25, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"This is yet another in a long line (literally thousands) of Engle Case lawsuits in Florida. The Engle case was a Supreme Court decision that overturned a $145 billion class-action judgement against Big Tobacco, while at the same time allowing individual lawsuits against various tobacco companies to be filed. This\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Engle case"","block_context":{"text":"Engle case","link":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?cat=24"},"img":{"alt_text":"0.8A!OpenElement&FieldElemFormat=gif","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/0.8AOpenElementFieldElemFormatgif.gif?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2883,"url":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=2883","url_meta":{"origin":2542,"position":5},"title":"RJ Reynolds punitive damages reduced from $23 billion to $16.9 million","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"February 1, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"This was entirely predictable. A Florida jury, in one of the thousands of Engle progeny cases, recently awarded a punitive judgement against RJ Reynolds for $23 billion because a widow's husband died from smoking cigarettes. 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