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FLORIDA RECORD

Thursday, March 28, 2024

Florida jury slaps tobacco company R.J. Reynolds with $5 million in damages for smoker’s heart disease case

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MIAMI — A jury for the 11th Judicial Circuit Court on Wednesday hit tobacco giant R.J. Reynolds with a $5 million damage award for the heart disease a man suffered after 30 years of smoking.

The jury also found punitive damages to punish R.J. Reynolds should be levied to be decided at a hearing on Nov. 26.

The trial has been streamed courtesy of the Courtroom View Network.

Paul Rouse, 64, underwent a triple bypass surgery in 1999 and sued R.J. Reynolds claiming his subsequent coronary heart disease had been caused by the company’s tobacco products, including Winston cigarettes. The allegations also stated that officials of the tobacco company had failed to properly warn smokers of the danger and had engaged in a policy of misinformation to profit from the sales of their cigarettes.

Rouse, who grew up in the tobacco growing region of North Carolina and started smoking as a 9-year-old, smoked up to two packs of cigarettes per day for 30 years.

The jury verdict found Rouse’s addiction to the nicotine in cigarettes was the cause of his coronary artery disease and that the disease had manifested itself before Nov. 21, 1996.

However the jury also decided that Rouse himself was partly responsible for his medical condition, a theme the defense had portrayed during the two-and-a-half-week trial.

The court assigned blame in the case 50 percent to R.J. Reynolds and 50 percent to Rouse.

The $5-million award was given for pain and suffering inflicted on Rouse, disability and physical impairment, disfigurement, mental anguish, inconvenience and loss of the capacity for the enjoyment of life, both for the past and to be sustained in the future.

The jury said there was clear and convincing evidence for punitive damages to also be levied against R.J. Reynolds to punish the tobacco company for its conduct.

During the trial, the attorney for Rouse, Alex Alvaraz of the Miami-based Alvaraz Law Firm, made a case that R.J. Reynolds officials had hired bogus expert scientists and researchers to deny the dangers of cigarette smoking and had falsified documents, engaging in a deception that included payoffs to Hollywood movie producers to feature cigarette smoking in their films.

Alvaraz said the smoking industry deliberately targeted teenagers for profit and to ensure the future of the cigarette market.

The attorney for R.J. Reynolds, Cory Hohnbaum of the Atlanta-based law firm of King & Spalding, while not denying the health damages caused by smoking, attempted to portray Rouse as suffering from other unhealthy habits, including obesity, diabetes and alcohol consumption. He said there was no proof that cigarette smoking was the sole cause of Rouse’s coronary heart disease.

Hohnbaum said Rouse bore the blame for his condition because while other people had realized the health risks and quit smoking, Rouse had not, despite warning labels on cigarette packs from the U.S. Surgeon General. He said Rouse had never made an attempt to quit smoking.

The case was one of thousands across the country that originated from “Engle versus Liggett Group,” a 1994 Florida class-action suit against tobacco companies in which jurors decided in favor of plaintiffs. The state later decertified the class but allowed individuals to proceed with their own suits against the companies.

The findings in the Engle verdict were also harshly critical of the tobacco industry, finding that industry officials had attempted to hide the dangers of smoking from the public.

Plaintiffs from the Engle case were required to prove that their suffering from nicotine addiction was the legal cause of their illness between the dates of May 5, 1990 and a cutoff date of Nov. 21, 1996.

Hohnbaum said Rouse never experienced chest pain symptoms between 1995 and 1999. Alvaraz countered that records showed Rouse had suffered chest pain symptoms for five years in the 1990s and before the Nov. 21, 1996 cutoff date.

Alvaraz had asked the jury for an $8.5-million damage award in the case.

Eleventh Judicial Circuit Court Judge Antonio Arzola presided in the case.

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