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Punitive damages award upheld in smoker death case

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LOS ANGELES—A California appeals court has upheld a $13.8 million punitive damages award against Philip Morris USA Inc. in a case involving the addiction, illness and death of a 45-year-old cigarette smoker.

In the 2-1 ruling, the 2nd District Court of Appeal in Los Angeles upheld the award by a Los Angeles County jury in the case of Betty Bullock, who had started smoking Marlboros in 1956 until she was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2001. Ms. Bullock died in 2003.

In her suit, filed in 2001, Ms. Bullock had accused the Richmond, Va.-based cigarette maker of product liability and fraud. In 2002, a jury awarded her $850,000 in compensatory damages for medical costs, pain and suffering, and $28 billion in punitive damages.

The trial judge reduced the punitive damages award to $28 million, and that amount was later reversed on appeal, the appeals court returning the punitive damages question to the trial court. On retrial, a jury awarded the $13.8 million in punitive damages in 2009.

Among other things, in its appeal Philip Morris argued that the punitive damages award was constitutionally excessive.

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