MIAMI - A former flight attendant's lung cancer was not caused by secondhand smoke she breathed while working in airplane cabins, a jury decided Tuesday.
Gail Routh, 54, was exposed to thousands of hours of secondhand smoke over her 27-year career with Allegheny Airlines and US Airways, said Stuart Silver, the attorney representing the woman in her case against Philip Morris USA, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., Lorillard Tobacco and Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp.
The jury decided exposure to secondhand smoke may cause lung cancer, but did not find that Routh's exposure caused her medical problems, which also include chronic sinusitis and bronchitis.
"To say there was some other cause is quite surprising," Silver said. "... This is a woman who was healthy as could be when she started working in 1972, a lifetime nonsmoker who had no medical problems."
"Medical evidence made it clear that Ms. Routh was genetically predisposed to contract the type of cancer from which she suffers," said Ronald Milstein, Lorillard vice president and general counsel. "Her exposure ... simply was not a contributing factor."
U.S. airlines banned smoking on domestic flights in 1990 and on international flights in 1997.
Contract signed to boost child support collections
TALLAHASSEE - Gov. Jeb Bush and the Florida Cabinet approved a $27.6-million consulting contract Tuesday with assurances that the state can collect an additional $2.9-billion in child support over a 10-year period.
The three-year deal was signed with Deloitte Consulting.
Florida presently collects 56.2 percent of support due slightly more than 900,000 children in programs administered by the state, ranking it at the midpoint nationally. Pennsylvania ranks first, capturing 71.5 percent of the child support dollars in the month due.
Department of Revenue executive director Jim Zingale predicted Florida would soon move to the forefront once the system is in place in two more years. Timely collection of child support is "one of the primary indicators for keeping families off of public assistance," Zingale said.
New all-electronic technology will give the state a longer reach on delinquent parents. It could mean suspending drivers' licenses or garnisheeing wages while giving authorities an avenue for daily updates with other states as well as private banking institutions with the use of Social Security numbers.
Boyd ends Senate bid, seeks re-election to House
TALLAHASSEE - U.S. Rep. Allen Boyd of Monticello said Tuesday he will drop a bid to win the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate and instead pursue a fifth term in the House.
The Senate seat is held by Bob Graham, who dropped out of the race for the Democratic presidential nomination last week. Graham, 66, has not said whether he'll seek a fourth term in the Senate. Several other Democrats in the Senate race are awaiting Graham's decision. They include former Education Commissioner Betty Castor of Tampa, Miami-Dade Mayor Alex Penelas and U.S. Reps. Alcee Hastings of Miramar and Peter Deutsch of Pembroke Pines. Seeking the Republican nomination are Florida House Speaker Johnnie Byrd of Plant City, state Sen. Daniel Webster of Winter Garden, conservative activist Larry Klayman of Miami and former U.S. Rep. Bill McCollum of Longwood. Sarasota auto dealer Vern Buchanan is considering it.
Republican state Rep. Bev Kilmer of Quincy is going after Boyd's U.S. House seat.
High schoolers brawl; 12 injured, 4 arrested
COCOA - Four Cocoa High School students were arrested Tuesday and at least 11 others and a police officer were taken to a hospital after a fight, officials said.
The students had been evacuated into Brevard Community College's gym after the school's fifth bomb threat in two weeks. Two female students began fighting in the bleachers. A female teacher and a Cocoa police officer were hit as they tried to break it up.
The students taken to the hospital with undisclosed injuries included two pregnant girls and the two who started fighting.
Police say angry man shoots girlfriend's family
ORLANDO - A man shot his girlfriend and three of her children early Tuesday, killing two teenagers and leaving the mother and the other child in critical condition, police said.
Wilson Cherenfant, 55, apparently shot them because the woman had found a new boyfriend, Orange County sheriff's spokesman Jim Solomons said.
Authorities had not released the victims' names late Tuesday.
A sheriff's deputy went to the apartment Cherenfant and the victims shared after someone called 911 and hung up without saying anything, Solomons said. Cherenfant answered the door holding a handgun but surrendered.
The deputy found the two dead teens, with multiple gunshot wounds, upstairs. The mother and another son, found downstairs, were taken to a hospital.
Cherenfant, a Haitian immigrant, was not the children's father, Solomons said.
