Judge rules tobacco firms lied to public

Published 9:00 pm Thursday, August 17, 2006

WASHINGTON – A federal judge ruled Thursday that tobacco companies have violated civil racketeering laws, concluding that cigarette makers conspired for decades to deceive the public about the dangers of their product and ordering the companies to make landmark changes in the way cigarettes are marketed.

But U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler said that under a 2005 appellate court ruling, she could not impose billions of dollars in penalties that had been sought by the Justice Department in its civil racketeering suit against the eight defendant tobacco companies.

All she could do, she said, was try to deter future illegal acts by the companies, and to that end, she ordered them to stop using terms such as “low tar,” “light” and “mild” and to undertake a massive media campaign in an effort to correct years of misrepresentations.

It is a penalty that will cost the industry millions of dollars – a fraction of the cost of sanctions the companies faced at the outset of the case, when the Justice Department sought $280 billion from the industry.

In the opinion, which runs 1,742 pages and was more than a year in the drafting, Kessler wrote that there is “overwhelming evidence” of most of the charges leveled at the industry: that it conspired to violate, and indeed violated, federal racketeering laws.

“In short,” she wrote, “defendants have marketed and sold their lethal product with zeal, with deception, with a single-minded focus on their financial success, and without regard for the human tragedy or social costs that success exacted.”

Tobacco companies officials indicated they would appeal at least parts of the decision.