Consumer Law

Those Crazy Kids ? Jury Hits Lorillard For Hooking Them Early

By Joe Consumer

Remember how appalled we all were watching that two-year-old Indonesian boy chain smoking when his YouTube video went viral this year?  I mean, there was outrage!

So tell me, is there so much difference between that tragic situation, and one right here in America, where Lorillard Tobacco Company parked a van outside of a housing project school playground handing out Newport menthol cigarettes to children, calling them ?fun??  And getting kids hooked on nicotine at such a young age that it became nearly impossible for them later to quit? 

A Massachusetts jury heard about this and yesterday, they expressed their outrage by hitting Lorillard with a $71 million verdict on behalf of the estate and son of a woman who was one of these children, who got these samples at least 50 times starting at age 9 and was addicted by age 13, tried unsuccessfully to quit 50 times and who eventually died of lung cancer.  The Boston Globe reports,

?It?s quite big in terms of not just the size of the award but really the reflected outrage of the jury after they learned of the detailed history of what Lorillard did in the 1950?s and 1960?s, acting in a predatory manner to promote Newports but at the direct expense of the health, safety, and very lives of people, including children,?? said Edward L. Sweda Jr., senior lawyer for the Tobacco Products Liability Project at the Northeastern University School of Law.

The novel aspects of this case was its focus on Lorillard?s strategy of targeting urban neighborhood with Newport, a menthol brand that is popular among African-Americans. According to the Tobacco Products Liability Project at Northeastern, 75 percent of African-Americans prefer menthol brands.

For more, check out the radio interview with one of the Center for Justice & Democracy?s Civil Justice Resource Group members, Professor Richard Daynard who runs the Tobacco Products Liability Project at the Northeastern University School of Law.

And lest we forget:

Full post as published by ThePopTort on December 15, 2010 (boomark / email).