$23.6 billion smoking case in Florida was won and awarded to a widow late Friday by a jury against the country's second-largest tobacco company, reports the New York Times. The charge with which R.J. Reynolds lost to the $23.6 billion smoking case was for causing the death of a chain smoker who died of lung cancer at the tender age of 36.
The $23.6 billion smoking case was awarded by a Florida jury in punitive damages against the tobacco giant, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, the lawyer of Cynthia Robinson said.
According to CNN, Robinson claimed her husband Michael Johnson died in 1996, and it was the fault of R.J. Reynolds for not informing him that nicotine is addictive and that smoking can cause lung cancer.
Johnson began his smoking habit at 13 and he died of lung cancer when he was 36, smoking for more than 20 years.
The NY Times said that tobacco company R. J. Reynolds promised a prompt appeal for the $23.6 billion smoking case.
In 2006, Johnson's widow, Cynthia Robinson of Pensacola, sued R. J. Reynolds, maker of Kool brand cigarettes which her husband had smoked. She argued that the company intentionally concealed the health hazards that cigarettes caused.
The $23.6 billion smoking case had a four-week trial which ended Wednesday. According to the NY Times, the Florida jury deliberated over two days for 18 hours. First, they awarded $17 million in compensatory damages. By Friday, they emerged at 10 p.m. with a $23.6 billion punitive judgment, which soon made headlines.
CNN said that according to Christopher Chestnut, Robinson's lawyer, the $23.6 billion smoking case which the jury awarded Friday evening is 'courageous.' He added that 'If anyone saw the documents that this jury saw, I believe that person would have awarded a similar or greater verdict amount.'
The $23.6 billion smoking case won from a trial held in Escambia County. It reportedly took four weeks and the jury deliberated for 15 hours, said the Pensacola News Journal. The newspaper said the verdict included more than $16 million in compensatory damages.
Robinson said in a phone interview Saturday of the winning the $23.6 billion smoking case, 'When they first read the verdict, I know I heard 'million,' and I got so excited. Then the attorney informed me that was a 'B' - billion. It was just unbelievable.'
According to Johnson, her husband was a longshoreman and hotel shuttle bus driver, to whom she was married with from 1990 until his death six years later. Her husband began smoking at age 13.
She said, 'He really did smoke a lot.' He reportedly had two children, who are now 23 and 29
J. Jeffery Raborn, vice president and assistant general counsel for R. J. Reynolds said Saturday in a statement of the $23.6 billion smoking case:
'The damages awarded in this case are grossly excessive and impermissible under state and constitutional law. This verdict goes far beyond the realm of reasonableness and fairness and is completely inconsistent with the evidence presented. We plan to file post-trial motions with the trial court promptly and are confident that the court will follow the law and not allow this runaway verdict to stand.'
Robinson's lawyer, Chestnut, said that five of the six jurors present during the $23.6 billion smoking case were 45 years old or younger. This reportedly means that he had to show them how the tobacco industry did not properly present the risks and dangers of tobaccos in the 1990s.
According to reports, the $23.6 billion smoking case in Florida was amongst thousands of the so-called "Engle progeny" cases which began from a 2006 court decision ruling saying smokers could not file class-action suits but they were free to do so individually.
The NY Times reports that the verdict for the $23.6 billion smoking case in Florida Friday was the highest granted to an Engle progeny case.
Georgia-based Christopher M. Chestnut represented Robinson, as well as Florida-based Willie E. Gary and Howard M. Acosta.
Chestnut said of the reactions of the jury in the $23.6 billion smoking case, 'The jury just got it. The jury was outraged with the concealment and the conspiracy to conceal that smoking was not only addictive but that there were deadly chemicals in cigarettes.'
Meanwhile, a lawyer from Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Named Scott P. Schlesinger who has sued big tobacco said the verdict as large as the $23.6 billion smoking case isn't typical. Schlesinger was not involved in the Robinson case.
He said, 'There have not been multibillion-dollar punishments in the Engle cases for one reason: We are afraid to ask for them. We are afraid of what will happen in the appellate process. This verdict is important because it goes back to an ongoing saga that goes back to 1990. People have been filing suit one by one, and we have been winning about 70 percent of them.'
$23.6 billion smoking case in Florida was filed back in 2008. It was once part of a class-action lawsuit in which a jury awarded $145 billion in damages, but in 2006 the Florida Supreme Court overturned that verdict. However, in its ruling, the state's high court opened its doors for individual lawsuits against tobacco companies, reports CNN.
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