Word: tobacco
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...California jury’s decision on Friday that Phillip Morris must pay $28 billion in punitive damages to a lifetime smoker may prove a blessing in disguise for the tobacco giant. Betty Bullock, a 64-year-old with lung cancer who has smoked since age 17, persuaded the jury to punish the company for malicious deception she claims lured her into addiction. They were so disgusted that they set the award a full $8 billion higher than Bullock’s attorney requested, and $25 billion higher than the largest settlement to date...
Whatever vulnerability the Bullock decision may seem to suggest for the tobacco industry, more than anything, it highlights the dangers inherent in using individual liability lawsuits to punish big tobacco. Not only have suits like Bullock’s been historically ineffective, but they also threaten to weaken support for other more effective types of legal attacks. Collective suits, like class actions or those by the government, exert more financial leverage on tobacco companies, rest on a stronger legal foundation and engender less skepticism from the public...
Cardullo was “a legend in Harvard Square,” says Paul Macdonald, owner of the Leavitt and Pierce tobacco store on Mass. Ave., where Cardullo was a frequent customer...
...could call him the unofficial mayor of Cambridge,” he says. “He was a pipe smoker, and he used to send the police into the store for his tobacco. He had that kind of a personality...
...heard of so-called socially responsible mutual funds; now comes one that's just the opposite, with its holdings concentrated in alcohol, tobacco, gambling and military contracting. Mutuals.com a money manager based in Dallas, calls its new investing vehicle the Vice Fund. And its strategy is no joke. Over the past five years, stocks from the sectors represented in the Vice Fund have, in aggregate, appreciated about four times as much as the S&P 500--and nearly 11 times as much as those in the Domini 400 index of socially responsible stocks. While more than 90% of the Vice...