Judge asked to award legal costs in tobacco trial
Posted on: Wednesday, 24 August 2005, 20:34 CDT
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Justice Department told a federal judge on Wednesday that cigarette makers should have to pay the legal costs the government has incurred if it prevails in its long-running racketeering case against them.
Lawyers for the department made the request in a brief filed with U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler, saying the cost of pursuing the case had been inflated by "both questionable and vexatious litigation tactics" tobacco companies had used throughout the case.
"An award of costs is particularly appropriate under these circumstances -- the statutes, case law, federal and local rules so establish," the department said in its brief.
The department did not pinpoint the exact amount it would seek. But as of earlier this year, it said the case had cost at least $130 million since it was filed in 1999.
A spokesman for Philip Morris USA said the company would have no comment until officials had a chance to study the brief. Other tobacco company representatives were not immediately available for comment.
In the brief filed on Wednesday, the department tried to buttress the arguments made during nearly nine months of hearings in the landmark case.
The government has charged that cigarette makers engaged in a 50-year scheme to deceive consumers about smoking's dangers and said sanctions were needed to prevent future wrongdoing.
The department has asked Kessler to force cigarette makers to fund a $10 billion quit-smoking program and another $4 billion anti-smoking education campaign. It asked Kessler to appoint monitors to enforce the remedies and impose further restrictions on the industry conduct.
Tobacco companies have countered that the government's case ignored restrictions placed on the industry in a 1998 settlement with state attorneys general and had failed to show the formation of an unlawful enterprise, as required to prove racketeering.
The companies have told Kessler that any remedy must be designed solely to prevent and restrain future racketeering violations.
Targeted in the lawsuit, filed in 1999, are Altria Group Inc. and its Philip Morris USA unit; Loews Corp.'s Lorillard Tobacco unit, which has a tracking stock, Carolina Group; Vector Group Ltd.'s Liggett Group; Reynolds American Inc.'s R.J. Reynolds Tobacco unit and British American Tobacco Plc unit British American Tobacco Investments Ltd.
An appeals court in February denied the government its biggest potential weapon in the case -- disgorgement of $280 billion in past tobacco profits.
The government has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review that decision.
Source: REUTERS
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