TAMPA - A Hillsborough County jury sided with two tobacco companies on Wednesday in a lawsuit brought by a longtime smoker.
Emmett A. Hall sued R.J. Reynolds and Brown & Williamson, claiming their cigarettes contributed to his lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
"This verdict shows once again that jurors who have seen the evidence generally use their common sense and conclude that smokers have long been aware of the well-known risks of smoking, and that people who chose to smoke in the face of these known risks would not be financially rewarded," said Stephanie E. Parker, lead attorney for R.J. Reynolds.
Hall, 75, of Temple Terrace began smoking when he was 15 years old. His trial lasted 51/2 weeks.
Howard Acosta, Hall's attorney, said his case was hamstrung when Circuit Judge James M. Barton ruled before trial that he would not be allowed to argue that the tobacco companies were only partly responsible for Hall's ailments. Acosta wanted to tell the jurors that Hall understood that he should have quit smoking earlier.
Given the judge's ruling, the jury had to find that the tobacco companies were 100 percent at fault to award Hall any money, Acosta said.
"We wanted to tell the jury that Mr. Hall accepted a large portion of the blame, and he only was seeking part of the damages from the cigarette companies," he said. "We weren't allowed to argue that at all. I think that is grounds for appeal."
Edward Sweda, senior attorney for the Tobacco Products Liability Project at the Northeastern School of Law in Boston, said he was disappointed in the verdict and equally disappointed that the judge did not allow Acosta to argue that both parties were at fault.
Some judges elsewhere have set similar limits on the plaintiff's arguments, while others have allowed plaintiffs' lawyers to make what is known as a comparative fault argument.
He said the tobacco companies have won about 70 percent of the lawsuits that have gone to verdict since the mid 1990s. Before that time, the companies won "basically all the cases," he said.
