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| S P E C I A L | Tobacco Under Attack |
Secondhand-smoke deal creates research foundation
Flight attendants can file separate suits
October 10, 1997
Web posted at: 12:13 p.m. EDT (1613 GMT)MIAMI (CNN) -- The tobacco industry has agreed to set aside $300 million for a research foundation as part of its settlement Friday with thousands of flight attendants, who filed a landmark lawsuit claiming secondhand smoke had sickened them.
Tobacco companies said they would make the contribution in yearly payments of $100 million, and agreed to back smoking bans on international flights. The foundation will seek cures for tobacco-related illnesses.
The settlement ended the first-ever secondhand smoke lawsuit against the industry to go to trial.
The 60,000 flight attendants who filed the lawsuit seeking $5 billion in damages will get nothing from the agreement except the right to file individual suits.
But plaintiffs attorney Stanley Rosenblatt said the settlement should make it easier for individuals to win damage awards.
"Every flight attendant going back to the '30s or '40s who would have been barred by statute of limitations now has the right to receive full compensatory damages," Rosenblatt said.
"They will now see their day in court," said Norma Broin, the lead plaintiff in the case.
Final approval of the deal isn't expected until January, to give the court time to notify all attendants who are eligible to file claims.
Because of Friday's settlement, in any future lawsuits filed by individual flight attendants, the tobacco industry must prove that secondhand smoke did not cause the plaintiff's disease.
"(We) are very pleased with the outcome. We think it's fair. We think it's in the best interest of the flight attendants," Rosenblatt said.
Circuit Judge Robert Kaye praised the jurors, saying their faithful attendance and attention had helped bring the matter to a close. The six jurors and seven alternates had listened to testimony since July 14.
"This has been a most unusual case," Kaye told them. "It is the first time ever a case of this nature has ever been tried in a court of law. It is a big case ... involving a great deal of legal issues that have never been decided."
The lawsuit, Norma Broin et al vs. Philip Morris Cos. Inc. et al, was filed after nonsmoking flight attendants claimed they were suffering from cancer and smoking-related illnesses from years of working aboard jetliners before smoking was banned on domestic flights in 1990.
Broin, a 21-year American Airlines attendant, was diagnosed in 1989 with an aggressive form of lung cancer. She insisted she never smoked a cigarette.
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Related stories:
- Settlement reached in secondhand smoke trial - October 10, 1997
- Big tobacco tells its side in airline smoking case - September 22, 1997
- Jurors reminded of evils of secondhand smoke - August 20, 1997
- Secondhand smoke trial under way - June 2, 1997
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