Tobacco Documents Online

Services of Mead Data Central, Ina n- PAGE 86 LEVEL 1- 24 OF 55 STORIES Copyright (c) 1988 U.S.News & World Report February 8, 1988 SECTION: U.S. NEWS; Pg. 20' LENGTH: 712 words HEADLINE: Taking on Big Tobacco in Dixie BYLINE: by Sandra R. Gregg in Lexington HIGHLIGHT: How one family is fighting the cigarette industry in a small Southern town BODY: * Late last month, a gray tornado blew up out of the board-flat cotton country of the Mississippi Delta and spun into the rolling hills around the county seat of Lexington, missing the town by a whisker. In the local courthouse, a judge suspended proceedings for a few hours. And as the storm blew by, the defense in this evolving courtroom drama hoped only that it would dodge disaster as neatly as the citzenry of Lexington. After all, there was an awful lot at stake. Money, for one thing. And a winning streak unlike any other in the annals of big business. The Nathan Henry Horton family v. the American Tobacco Company is a case that is something of a humdinger. The facts are fairly straightforward, the implications anything but. The background: Nathan Horton, carpenter and ex-Navy seaman, smoked two packs of unfiltered Pall Malls a day. He did that for more than 35 years, right up until he died last year. He was 50. Horton's family -- alleging that smoking causes cancer and that, in addition, the Pall Cia11s were contaminated with cancer-causing i!nsecticides -- has sued. They want 3 17 million. And according to some lawyers and tobacco-industry experts, they jus t might get it. A mistrial at week's end clouded the picture. But if the Hortons prevail when the case is retried, It'll reverse an extraordinary record for Big Tobacco, which has seen some 200 product-liability cases resolved in its favor over the years. Peculiarities, plaintiffs' rights For the $ 33.7 billion industry, it would be a particularly irksome development. Just last week, as the jury in the Horton case broke off deliberations, proceedings in another high-profile liability case against the tobacco industry were getting under way in New Jersey. And while the Horton case turns, in part, on a peculiarity of Mississippi law (jurors there may award a percentage of damages to a plaintiff even if they find a defendant only partially at fault), the determinative facts concern claims that, by the time warning Labels were mandated on cigarette packages in 1966, many smokers were addicted and could not stop. Win or lose, cases like Horton family's spotlight increasing uneasiness about the industry. Since December, stock prices have dipped about 10 percent, on average, below the market -- perhaps in anticipation of the coming lawsuits. And if the industry loses in,Lexington, stock prices will drop further thoug h probably not to catastrophic levels because of the diversity of its ho~diingso t= LEX1S'IVEJifIS'LEXIS'NExIS'

Services of Mead Data Central, Ina. PAGE 87' (c) 1988' U:~.S.News & World Report, February &, 1988' American Brands, for instance, derives 50 percent of its profits from cigarette sales. But it also owns Masterlock, Jim Beam and Franklin Life Insurance. Franklin, by they way, offers discounts to nonsmokers. The cumulative effect of the lawsuits is to;fuel public debate over the dangers of smoking. There is also a more practical side, one that can only cause more uneasiness in the tobacco industry. With each new case, plaintiff s learn!new legal stratagems while their lawyers uncover more and more about the tobacco industry through discovery proceedings. Richard Daynard, chairman of the 3-year old Tobacco Products Liability Project at Northeastern University Law School, is encouraging plaintiffs' attorneys to share information as they explore new arguments. "I think there will be a large number of cases brought," says Daynard, "and many able and well-paid lawyers becoming involved." And this, ultimately, is the significance of the trial in the little courthouse in Lexington. It is here, in this turn-of-the-century courtroom with the hard wooden seats, that the case of Nathan Horton may, better than any surgeon general's warning, finally give the lie to the tobacco industry's oft heard refrain that there is nothing to prove that cigarette smoking causes cancer. It's a message that seems to be getting through. While 350,000 smokers die in the U.S. of smoke-related illnesses each year, an additional 1.5 million stop puffing. At the same time, according to the Smoking Policy Institute, about 50 percent of the U.S businesses have instituted some sort of antismokinq op 1iicy. And because of publicity surrounding cases like the Horton family's, those instances are increasing in number and severity. GRAPHIC: Pictures 1 and 2, Natha Horton died addicted to the weed. His widow Ella and stepson, Nathan, aim to send a message with their suit, CATHY PLUNKETT -- AP; Graph, BLOWING SMOKE, USN&WR -- Basic data: U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services LEX1S' II SEJlCI S' LEXI S' RlEXAS'