Tag: Massachusetts

  • Massachusetts Judge Issues Record-Setting Judgement

    Massachusetts Judge Issues Record-Setting Judgement

    A judge in Hampden County, Massachusetts, issued one of the biggest individual civil judgments in history, awarding $105 million to the family of a deceased smoker. Judge Edward McDonough Jr.’s decision came a month after a jury awarded the plaintiffs $10.6 million after a month-long trial, with the judge saying the defendant, R.J. Reynolds, “willfully and wantonly” engaged in a conspiracy to hide the health hazards of cigarette smoking.

    Kevin Penza, along with his daughter, Kimberly Breen Penza, sued on behalf of his late wife, Jacqueline, who died from lung cancer at 59. The plaintiffs argued Jacqueline spent much of her life trying to quit the smoking habit, but was trapped in a nicotine addiction she could not defeat. The defense countered she was a committed smoker who made her own choices and refused to quit despite pleas from her family and doctors.

    McDonough began with the jury’s $10.6 million decision and added $2 million in attorney’s fees. The additional sum included interest and fees, but he did not clarify how the final sum was reached. R.J. Reynolds is expected to appeal this ruling.

  • Tobacco Firms Settle MSA Dispute

    Tobacco Firms Settle MSA Dispute

    Image: mehaniq41

    Tobacco companies will pay Massachusetts hundreds of millions of dollars to settle a dispute about how much the cigarette manufacturers owe the state.

    The deal ends a dispute stemming from the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement (MSA) in which tobacco companies agreed to pay states billions of dollars each year to offset medical expenses stemming from smoking.

    Claiming that some MSA signatories withheld “substantial funds,” the Massachusetts attorney general’s office sent disputes over hundreds of millions of dollars into arbitration.

    Monday’s announced deal resolves seven of those past disputes for 2005 through 2011, the office said, and will result in $600 million being paid to the commonwealth this year and “tens of millions” each year going forward.

    “The country’s major tobacco manufacturers have pushed smoking products to young people for decades—and this settlement is evidence of our ongoing commitment to hold these companies accountable for their actions that caused irreparable harm to public health and safety,” said Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell in a statement.

  • C-Stores Campaign Against Age Bans

    C-Stores Campaign Against Age Bans

    Credit: Daniel

    The New England Convenience Store and Energy Marketers Association (NECSEMA) has launched a grassroots campaign this week to oppose generational bans on tobacco and nicotine products.

    The Stoughton, Massachusetts-based association stated that the ban on tobacco sales tied to birthdate threatens civil liberties in Massachusetts. They believe that if unopposed, it could lead to local bans on various other products including gambling, alcohol, cannabis, sugary drinks, fatty foods, and caffeine.

    Alex Weatherall, NECSEMA president, stated that these policies are establishing a concerning precedent by giving local boards of health the unilateral authority to determine if an individual is “adult enough” to purchase legal products statewide and nationwide, according to media reports.

    Weatherall believes that this sets a dangerous precedent, adding that local officials are imposing their morality on citizens of the Commonwealth. NECSEMA said it created the advocacy group Citizens for Adult Choice to educate the public about the dangers these local bans pose for law-abiding adults in Massachusetts.

  • Massachusetts Court OKs Generational Ban

    Massachusetts Court OKs Generational Ban

    Brookline, Massachusetts (Credit: Wangkun Jia)

    The highest court in Massachusetts ignored objections from vape shop owners and tobacco retailers and upheld the legality of a novel bylaw that bars cigarette sales to anyone born after January 1, 2000, in the town of Brookline. The restriction, the first of its kind in the United States, is designed to prevent future generations from using not only tobacco but also nicotine.

    Retailers argued that the 2021 Brookline bylaw was pre-empted by a state law approved in 2018 that raised the minimum age for purchasing a tobacco product from 18 to 21, according to media reports. The retailers pointed out that the Brookline bylaw effectively means someone born after January 1, 2000, will not be able to purchase a nicotine product regardless of their age.

    Over time, as the population ages, the bylaw will effectively ban the sale of tobacco products in the town.

    In the Supreme Judicial Court’s unanimous opinion, written by Justice Dalila Wendlandt, the court acknowledged the Brookline bylaw is more restrictive than the state’s minimum age standard, but the justices had no issues with that. They said the bylaw “augments the state statute” by further limiting access to tobacco products to persons under the age of 21.

    The court rejected claims by the tobacco retailers that the state law was designed to clarify what had become a muddled regulatory environment as municipality after municipality raised the minimum age for buying tobacco products.

    “The retailers claim that the purpose of the Tobacco Act was ‘actually to benefit tobacco retailers . . . by eliminating the confusion that arises when the minimum age for purchasing tobacco varies from town to town and city to city across the Commonwealth,’” the opinion said. “To the contrary, the act reflects the legislative intent to protect young persons and other vulnerable populations from the deleterious health effects of tobacco product use.”

    The case drew attention in Massachusetts and around the nation and the world and the outcome is likely to prompt more communities to follow Brookline’s lead, creating a patchwork quilt of regulation of tobacco products.

  • Court Sets Wrongful Death Timeline

    Court Sets Wrongful Death Timeline

    Image: mehaniq41 | Adobe Stock

    The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts ruled that family members of a deceased individual cannot file wrongful death suits if the death occurred more than three years after the injury that caused the death, reports Reuters. This ruling upholds the dismissal of claims against Philip Morris USA and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. 

    Under Massachusetts law, according to Justice David Lowy, wrongful death claims are “derivative” of personal injury claims that the deceased could have brought in life. If the three-year statute of limitations has run out at time of death, family members have no wrongful death claims. 

    This latest decision follows two lawsuits, one against Philip Morris USA in 2017 (Fabiano v. Philip Morris USA Inc and others, No. SJC-13282) and one against R.J. Reynolds in 2016 (Fuller v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co and others, No. SJC-13346). Both were brought by the wives of men who became sick and died after lifetimes of smoking. The lawsuits accused the companies of breach of warranty, negligence and conspiracy. These wrongful death claims were dismissed by different trial judges, who stated that both men would have been time-barred from bringing their own claims when they died, meaning their family members were not able to file wrongful death claims.

    The Supreme Judicial Court agreed to hear both cases. The court previously decided that wrongful death claims are derivative of the deceased’s claims but had not addressed how that would affect the statute of limitations, according to Lowy’s opinion.

    The statute of limitations for the deceased’s underlying injury claims determines whether surviving family can bring a wrongful death claim, according to the language of the Massachusetts wrongful death law.

    Lowy wrote that the decision “in no way changes what has long been true of persons suffering from serious injuries,” in a footnote addressing an argument by plaintiffs that the decision creates a “fundamental unfairness” by forcing sick individuals to bring lawsuits while they are suffering or forfeit their heirs’ rights to recovery.

    “Once those injuries are knowable, plaintiffs must assert their rights within a specified period of time or lose their ability to recover for their injuries,” Lowy wrote. 

  • PM to Pay $36 Million in Massachusetts Suit

    PM to Pay $36 Million in Massachusetts Suit

    Court, courtroom, law.

    A Massachusetts unanimous state Supreme Judicial Court ruling awarded $37 million to a plaintiff in a lawsuit against Philip Morris USA.

    Issued Tuesday, the justices’ opinion found enough evidence to support a prior jury verdict and lower court judge’s rulings against the company in a case that claimed that the company’s cigarettes — and the company’s claims about them — resulted in the plaintiff’s cancer, reports WBUR.

    In the high court opinion, written by Justice Scott Kafker, the justices found the company failed to disclose its own research to customers, which showed that filtered cigarettes were even more damaging to human DNA than regular cigarettes.

    The opinion noted Philip Morris did not dispute that cigarettes are harmful to health. Instead, the company claimed there was no evidence linking its advertisements to Greene’s personal decision to take up Marlboro Lights as a safer alternative.

  • Study: Menthol Ban Increased Smoking Among Black Women

    Study: Menthol Ban Increased Smoking Among Black Women

    Image: deagreez | Adobe Stock

    Massachusetts’ menthol cigarette ban led to a net increase in smoking among Black adults, according to a research letter published in JAMA Internal Medicine, reports the Reason Foundation.

    Samuel Asare, principal scientist in tobacco control research at the American Cancer Society, suggested that banning menthol cigarettes is counterproductive to public health goals and called for better health equity.

    “As the [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] plans to eliminate menthol as a characterizing flavor in cigarettes, interventions should address possible increases in cigarette smoking among Black females,” the research letter states.

    The research showed that the menthol ban led to an 8.1 percent relative decrease in smoking among adults aged 25 and older, with the prevalence of current cigarette use dropping from 13 percent in 2019 to 12 percent in 2021. Part of this decrease was due to a 56.8 percent relative decrease in smoking among Black men. However, with a 58.6 percent relative increase in smoking among Black women and an equal prevalence of smoking among both genders in 2019, the menthol cigarette ban led to a net increase in smoking among Black adults in Massachusetts.

  • Eonsmoke Settles Youth-Marketing Lawsuit

    Eonsmoke Settles Youth-Marketing Lawsuit

    Photo: Vitalii Vodolazskyi

    Eonsmoke and its co-owners will pay Massachusetts nearly $51 million to settle a lawsuit over selling vapor products to minors, the office of Attorney General Maura Healey announced on its website. The e-cigarette retailer has also agreed to stop selling its products in the state.

    The AG’s settlement resolves allegations that the defendants directly targeted young people for sales of its vaping products through marketing and advertising intended to appeal to youth. The attorney general’s office also alleged that Eonsmoke failed to verify the age of online purchasers of its products and failed to ensure shipments of these products were received by a person 21 years or older, the state’s minimum legal sales age for smoking products.

    “Eonsmoke coordinated a campaign that intentionally targeted young people and sold dangerous and addictive vaping products directly to minors through their website,” said Healey. “We were the first to take action against this company and its owners, and today we are holding them accountable and permanently stopping them from conducting these illegal practices in our state.”

    Eonsmoke ceased all operations and dissolved in 2020. If co-owners Gregory Grishayev and Michael Tolmach want to sell tobacco products in Massachusetts in the future, they are required to get authorization from the Food and Drug Administration and give notice to the AG’s Office to ensure compliance with federal and state law.

  • State Flavor Ban Drives Users Elsewhere

    State Flavor Ban Drives Users Elsewhere

    Photo: Miriam Doerr | Dreamstime.com

    Massachusetts’ ban on the sale of flavored tobacco products has shifted rather than reduced tobacco consumption, according to Ulrik Boesen, senior policy analyst with the Center for State Tax Policy at the Tax Foundation.
     
    On June 1, Massachusetts’ ban on the sale of flavored tobacco products, including menthol cigarettes, took effect. At first sight, early data suggests a public health success: sales of cigarette tax stamps in the Bay State have declined 9.2 percent in the first half of 2020 compared to the same months last year.
     
    However, sales of tax stamps in the Northeast region (Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont) have remained stable in the first half of 2020, suggesting Massachusetts consumers are now buying their tobacco products in neighboring states.
     
    From Jan. 1, 2020, to June 30, 2020, 311,848,000 stamps were sold in the region. For the same period in 2019, that number was 311,974,000. For June alone, sales actually increased from 53,877,000 in 2019 to 63,449,000 in 2020.
     
    Tobacco tax collections, too, have shifted elsewhere, according to Boesen. In December last year, the Massachusetts Department of Revenue estimated the ban would decrease collections by $93 million in 2021. That revenue is now being collected by Massachusetts neighbors.
     
    “It is not in the interest of Massachusetts to pursue a public health measure that merely sends tax revenue to their neighboring states without improving public health,” writes Boesen. “In addition, the ban on flavored tobacco highlights the complications of contradictory tax and regulatory policy, the instability of excise taxes that go beyond pricing in the cost of externalities, and the public risks of driving consumers into the black market through excessive taxation or regulation.”