ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, August 24, 1996 TAG: 9608260051
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: INDIANAPOLIS
SOURCE: Associated Press
A jury Friday found cigarette companies not responsible for a smoker's cancer death, a break for the tobacco industry, which lost a similar lawsuit this month and faces new federal regulations.
The estate and widow of Richard Rogers had sought at least $424,000 from four tobacco companies for lost earnings and medical expenses. Rogers, whose sneaked smokes at age 5 grew into a three-pack-a-day habit, died of lung cancer in 1987 at the age of 52.
The suit - filed shortly before his death -claimed Rogers, an attorney, was addicted to cigarettes and that smoking caused his cancer.
The tobacco companies - Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds, American Tobacco and Liggett - said Rogers' illness was his responsibility.
The Rogers case, similar to the many other health-related tobacco suits, took on extreme importance as the industry wondered whether the tide of opinion in America's courtrooms has turned against it. Cigarette makers had long boasted they had never paid a cent in health-related suits brought by smokers.
A Florida jury this month awarded $750,000 to a man who got lung cancer after 44 years of smoking. It was only the second time a jury has ruled against the industry. The first verdict was overturned on appeal.
Tobacco stocks plunged after the verdict and have failed to recover, unlike with past legal setbacks.
The verdict came after 16 hours of deliberations by the Marion County jury
In closing arguments, plaintiff's attorney C. Warren Holland told jurors that Richard Rogers was addicted to cigarettes even before the 1964 surgeon general's warning, and that tobacco companies were aware all along that their product was ``unreasonably dangerous.''
Holland also said the companies should be held responsible for making cigarettes addictive. ``This is not just a habit.''
But the tobacco companies said Rogers had continued to smoke willingly, despite a public perception of dangers heightened by the surgeon general's report and then by cigarette warning labels.
When asked shortly before his death by a tobacco executive why he hadn't stopped smoking earlier, Rogers had responded, ``I really didn't want to quit,'' Philip Morris lawyer David Hardy told jurors.
In the Florida case, lawyers were able to introduce tobacco company documents linking nicotine and addiction, but these records were barred from the Rogers case because it was a retrial and the judge limited evidence to that introduced the first time.
LENGTH: Medium: 55 linesby CNB