Florida jury awards $8 million to smoker’s widow

By Calvin Palmer

A Florida jury awarded $8 million (£5.6 million) yesterday to the widow of a smoker whose death was caused by his addiction to cigarettes.

The decision of the jury in Fort Lauderdale could prove to be a major potential legal setback for tobacco company Philip Morris.

Their verdict was in favor of Elaine Hess, widow of longtime smoker Stuart Hess, who died of lung cancer in 1997 at age 55. He had smoked for 40 years.

Philip Morris USA, a unit of Altria Group Inc, said it would appeal.

The verdict is the first of potentially thousands of cases to go to trial in Florida.

Alex Alvarez, an attorney for Elaine Hess, said he and other lawyers who worked on the case felt vindicated after winning $5 million (£3.5 million) in punitive damages on Mrs. Hess’ behalf and $3 million (£2.1 million) in compensatory damages.

“She’s a 110-pound elementary school teacher, and she went up against Philip Morris, one of the most powerful companies in the world, and won,” Alvarez told Reuters.

“We have paved the road for these other litigants to come in and seek their day in court as well. We’re happy to be able to do that for them.”

Of course, he is happy.  What Alvarez failed to point out is that he and other plaintiffs’ lawyers stand to make millions out of these cases.  They could be on a nice little earner.

Alvarez was referring to about 8,000 cases filed after the Florida Supreme Court’s landmark decision in 2006 to throw out a $145 billion (£102 billion) jury award in a class-action lawsuit filed in the early 1990s by Miami Beach pediatrician Howard Engle on behalf of thousands of sick smokers.

In its 2006 ruling, the state Supreme Court left in place key findings that tobacco companies knowingly sold dangerous products and concealed the risks of smoking.

That promised to help the thousands of smokers who filed individual lawsuits against the tobacco companies because they would not have to prove those issues again.

In a statement saying it would seek appellate review of the case and of what it called the “constitutionally flawed” punitive damage verdict, Philip Morris vowed to fight on against all pending litigation in Florida.

“We will vigorously defend each of these cases, which will turn on the facts unique to each plaintiff. We do not believe today’s verdict is predictive of outcomes in future cases,” said Murray Garnick, an Altria senior vice president and associate general counsel, speaking on behalf of Philip Morris.

“This case was selected by plaintiffs’ lawyers from among thousands of others to be the first tried presumably because they believed it was their best case,” said Garnick.

Edward Sweda, a senior attorney for the Tobacco Products Liability Project at Northeastern University School of Law in Boston, agreed the Hess case was no guarantee of the result of future trials.

But he added that it also did not bode well for Philip Morris or its parent company.

It also doesn’t bode well for common sense or people taking responsibility for the outcomes of their own actions.  When Hess started smoking 40 years ago the risks of smoking were well-known, unless Hess was illiterate or he and his wife belonged to a strange sect that had absolutely no contact with the outside world.

It was a choice Hess  made of his own volition.  It turned out to be a bad choice and so there has to be someone to blame, such is the litigious, I would even go as far as to say childish, nature of American society, a trait that is also fast becoming ingrained in the  British way of life.

Strange how premature deaths from alcohol abuse do not seem to generate lawsuits against the beer and liquor companies.

This ruling and the cases being brought against the tobacco companies do not represent justice. They represent the agenda of the vociferous anti-tobacco lobby who will not rest until tobacco is removed from society.  There is no rhyme or reason to it, just plain hatred of tobacco and tobacco users.

It is the mentality of the Salem witch trials.

[Based on a report by Reuters.]

Judge calls mistrial after verdict reached by 13 jurors

By Calvin Palmer

When a jury in Harris County, Texas, reached a verdict of guilty yesterday in a murder trial, the judge suddenly declared a mistrial on discovering that the jury comprised 13 citizens.

State District Judge Mark Kent Ellis said a jury in a criminal trial must have 12 people on it and be free from any outside influences.  He said the 13th juror would be considered an outside influence, despite the fact that she sat through all of the testimony.

“In 23 years I’ve never seen anything like this,” Ellis said. “The jurors all seemed pretty upset, but there’s no way to unring that bell.”

The simplistic and refreshing way Americans have of putting something into words is a sheer delight.

A British judge in similar circumstances would give a far lengthier quote, probably one containing legal and perhaps witty literary references.

“There’s no way to unring that bell” is concise and a testament to the descriptive legacy of Mark Twain.

The judge became more prosaic when he attributed the blame to a substitute court bailiff.

“I told him I never want to see him in my courtroom again,” Ellis said.

The judge did not know the bailiff’s name.

Officials at the sheriff’s office — Houston’s bailiffs are sheriff’s deputies — agreed the mistake was the bailiff’s fault. Spokesman Paul Mabry said the bailiff had been substituting at the courthouse for about a year, but he also didn’t know the man’s name.

Juror Paula Harlan said the extra juror tried to leave, but the bailiff said she needed to complete paperwork that was never brought to her.

“It was a weird deal,” Harlan said. “And the judge seemed upset, but the bailiff also looked pretty upset. It’s disappointing that the victim’s family has to go through it again.”

[Based on reports by the Houston Chronicle and Associated Press.]