Phillip Morris Loses Lawsuit Against Uruguay on Tough Tobacco Rules

triplepundit.com – 11 de Julio 2016 – EEUU

An international trade court ruled against Philip Morris International (PMI) in the company’s lawsuit against the government of Uruguay over tobacco-labeling rules. The International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes’ (ICSID) decision to side with Uruguay, a country with a GDP of $53 billion, and not with PMI and its annual revenues of $80 billion sends a signal: Small countries can implement public health policies however they want without the interference of multinational corporations backed by huge lobbying and legal budgets.

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http://www.triplepundit.com/2016/07/uruguay-wins-lawsuit-vs-phillip-morris-tough-tobacco-rules/# 

A dangerous habit: e-cigarette explosions prompt a string of California lawsuits

Digitaltrendsf.com– 20 de Noviembre de 2015 – EEUU

They’re often promoted as the safer alternative to cigarettes, but there’s nothing safe about an e-cigarette exploding in your mouth. A string of disastrous incidents involving volatile electronic cigarettes has now prompted three lawsuits in California, and it seems these cases will only increase in number.

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http://www.digitaltrends.com/sports/e-cigarette-explosion-lawsuits/#ixzz3sJqUq29L 

E-cigarette explosions prompt three lawsuits in California

latimes.com – 19 de Noviembre de 2015 – EEUU

Vicente Garza was getting ready for bed in his Bakersfield home when he decided to use an electronic cigarette.

He lifted the device to his mouth, pushed the vapor button and started to inhale. Then it exploded near his face, badly burning his mouth and dominant left hand, which was holding the device. Doctors amputated Garza’s left index finger, and he had to undergo immediate surgery on his tongue after the Oct. 16 incident. He still can barely eat.

Garza’s attorney, Gregory L. Bentley, said Thursday that he had filed a product liability lawsuit against the e-cigarette’s manufacturer and designer, Flawless Vapes & Supplies, LLC; the Bakersfield store where Garza bought the battery and device, Luxor Cafe & Vape Lounge; and the Bakersfield store where he bought his e-cigarette charger, Vape Fame.

“I never in my life thought that something like this would happen,” Garza, 23, said at a Glendale news conference Thursday.

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http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-e-cigarette-lawsuits-20151119-story.html

Santa Fe Natural Tobacco Company on the target for a lawsuit

thehindu.com – 4 de octubre de 2015 – EEUU
The Santa Fe Natural Tobacco company, behind the American Spirit cigarette brand, is the target of a class-action lawsuit, and they have asked to meet with the FDA to discuss their marketing techniques.

The complaints are made from a law firm from Florida, based on the accusation that the cigarette company is deceiving consumers by making them believe that their cigarettes are healthier. Documents from the lawsuit warn the FDA of the use of words like “natural” or “additive free” in their marketing and advertising strategies, violating the law.

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http://www.pulseheadlines.com/santa-fe-natural-tobacco-company-target-lawsuit/7588/ 

Australian government’s $50m investment in defending against Big Tobacco legal thuggery

aljazeera.com – 29 de Julio de 2015 – Australia

Imagine you were about to buy a property and were advised that in two years time, a major freeway would be built two hundred metres away, greatly diminishing the value of your purchase. Then imagine you went ahead anyway, the freeway was built, and your property value went down as expected. You took the person who sold you the property and the government who built the freeway to court, seeking compensation.

Fools and their money are easily parted.

This is, in effect, what the tobacco transnational Philip Morris has done with Australia’s plain tobacco packaging laws, fully implemented in December 2012, when it started legal proceedings against the Australian government under a bilateral trade agreement between Hong Kong and Australia signed in 1993. The arrogant claim being made is that our plain packaging law breaches the agreement between the government of Hong Kong and the government of Australia for the promotion and protection of investments.

The Rudd government announced plain packaging on April 29, 2010. At that time, Philip Morris tobacco products in Australia were manufactured by Philip Morris Australia. On February 23, 2011, Philip Morris Asia purchased Philip Morris Australia and on June 27, 2011 – a full 14 months after knowing the government intended to introduce plain packs – Philip Morris Asia served its notice of claim to the Australian government.

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http://theconversation.com/australian-governments-50m-investment-in-defending-against-big-tobacco-legal-thuggery-45427

Canadian tobacco firms ordered to pay record fines

worldfinance.com – 4de Junio  de 2015 –  Canadá

Following a lengthy class-action lawsuit, the Quebec Superior Court has ordered that three major tobacco companies pay C$15bn in damages, for failing to adequately inform smokers about the risks associated with their products. Legal proceedings began in March 2012, 13 years after the lawsuit was initiated, and involves JTI-MacDonald, Imperial Tobacco and Rothmans Benson & Hedges, who have each stated they will appeal against the decision.

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http://www.worldfinance.com/home/canadian-tobacco-firms-ordered-to-pay-record-fines 

Scenes from the last great tobacco war being waged in a courtroom in Orlando

orlandoweekly.com – 26 de Febrero de 2015 – EE.UU.

For almost three years, the Nashville-based attorney has been hip-deep in cigarette litigation. He's representing a seriously ill plaintiff who measures time by each labored breath, and he's facing adversaries with virtually unlimited resources and every incentive in the world to stall. He's gotten this far, 700 miles from home in an Orlando federal courtroom, on his skill cutting through the rhetoric of corporate obfuscation.

Now, a week and a half into an almost three-week federal trial in Orlando in October, the biggest cigarette companies in the U.S. are attempting to shut him up.

As his case, Kerrivan v. R.J. Reynolds et al., hurtles toward the jury, lawyers for Philip Morris and Reynolds have filed a motion to keep Byrd from using phrases he used in the closing arguments of other tobacco trials. What the defendants don't want is for Byrd, in full-on preacher mode, to characterize them the way he did the month before in Jacksonville. Standing before a jury, Byrd had laid a veritable death toll at the tobacco companies' feet.

"They have killed grandmothers and grandfathers," Byrd told the jurors. "They have killed aunts and uncles, mommies and daddies, they have killed sisters and brothers."

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http://www.orlandoweekly.com/orlando/scenes-from-the-last-great-tobacco-war-being-waged-in-a-courtroom-in-orlando/Content?oid=2364557

Tobacco Companies Agree to Settle Lawsuits in Florida Federal Courts

wsj.com – 26 de Febrero de 2015 – EEUU

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http://www.wsj.com/articles/tobacco-companies-agree-to-settle-lawsuits-1424876422

Japan Tobacco’s packaging objections look set for courts

irishtimes.com – 18 de Febrero de 2015 – Japón

The threat by Japan Tobacco Group to promptly sue the Government over draft laws to ban branded tobacco packaging stands as a blatant intrusion into Ireland’s political process in the interests of its own profit.

The business, which owns the Benson & Hedges and Silk Cut brands, could have waited for the Oireachtas to enact the law before proceeding to the Four Courts with an action to vindicate its intellectual and other property rights.

Instead, the firm’s Irish unit sent unambiguous missives to Ministers James Reilly and Leo Varadkar in which it purported to instruct them to stop the legislation in its tracks within 10 days or face a High Court claim for damages. As if to maintain some kind of decorum as hostilities intensify, the threat was copied to Taoiseach Enda Kenny.

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http://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/japan-tobacco-s-packaging-objections-look-set-for-courts-1.2107360

thespec.com – 12 de diciembre de 2014 – Canadá

Multibillion-dollar lawsuit against Big Tobacco now in judge's hands

MONTREAL — A class-action lawsuit that targets three Canadian tobacco manufacturers for nearly $20 billion has ended after nearly three years of testimony.

Closing arguments were held in Montreal today and Quebec Superior Court Justice Brian Riordan took the case under deliberation.

While the trial began in March 2012, the legal proceedings actually date back to 1998.

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http://www.thespec.com/news-story/5203449-multibillion-dollar-lawsuit-against-big-tobacco-now-in-judge-s-hands/

wsbradio.com – 22 de Noviembre de 2014 – EEUU

Boca widow wins $4 million from tobacco companies in addiction case

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer A Boca Raton widow has won $4 million from tobacco giants R.J. Reynolds and Phillip Morris over the death of her husband.

In the two-week Palm Beach County Circuit Court jury trial that ended late Friday, Debbie Perrotto’s attorneys claimed the cigarette companies used deceptive advertising — such as saying filtered cigarettes are safer than unfiltered — and hid cigarettes’ health effects. As a result, her husband, Nicholas, got addicted without knowing the downsides of smoking, they said.

Nicholas Perrotto was 56 when he died of lung cancer in September 1996.

When Debbie Perrotto will see the money is unknown. The tobacco companies plan to appeal the decision, so it could be several years.

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http://www.wsbradio.com/news/news/local/boca-widow-wins-4-million-from-tobacco-companies-i/njDfG/

opednews.com – 12 de Noviembre de 2014 – Uruguay

Uruguay Presents Defense Against Philip Morris Tobacco Lawsuit

Reprinted from www.corpwatch.org

Uruguay has presented a 500 page document to defend itself against an international lawsuit challenging the country's tough tobacco packaging regulations. The claim was brought by Philip Morris, the global tobacco giant, at the World Bank's International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) in Washington DC.

Philip Morris filed the original complaint on February 19, 2010, claiming that Uruguay's laws were a violation of a 1991 bilateral investment treaty between Uruguay and Switzerland. The company says that legal requirements that graphic warnings about the health hazards of smoking must cover most of the surface area of cigarette packets have harmed the company's trademarks and profits.

"The large size of these warnings prevents us from effectively displaying our trademarks and goes beyond what could reasonably be considered appropriate to inform consumers of the well-established health risks of smoking," Morgan Rees, a spokesperson for Philip Morris, told Investment Arbirtation Reporter. "This is without precedent anywhere in the world."

On October 13, 2014, Paul Reichler, a lawyer with Foley Hoag, in Washington DC, responded on behalf of the Uruguayan government, citing the country's obligations under the World Health Organization’s 2005 Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

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See more at: http://www.opednews.com/articles/Uruguay-Presents-Defense-A-by-Corp-Watch-Health_Lawsuits_Tobacco-141112-871.html

montrealgazette.com – 25 de septiembre de 2014 – Canadá

$20 billion class-action lawsuit against tobacco companies enters final stage

MONTREAL — A $20-billion class-action lawsuit brought against Canada’s three major tobacco companies entered its final stage on Monday as a Quebec Superior Court judge began hearing closing arguments in the case.

Evidence began being presented to Justice Brian Riordan two years ago and the lawsuit was originally filed in 1998. The final arguments are expected to continue for at least 18 days and conclude in November.

The case actually involves two class-action suits being heard at the same time. It is the first class-action lawsuit against a tobacco company to go to trial in Canada. One case involves more than 160,000 smokers and former smokers who are victims of lung and throat cancer or emphysema seeking more than $11 billion. The other represents more than 918,000 people who became dependent on tobacco because of the addictiveness of nicotine. They are seeking more than $9 billion.

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http://www.montrealgazette.com/health/billion+class+action+lawsuit+against+tobacco+companies+enters+final+stage/10225582/story.html