Word: tobacco
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...targets of government wrath in American industry, none have been scorched more severely or more often than U.S. tobacco companies. But despite being hit with everything from health-warning labels to smoking bans in buildings to Vice President Al Gore's tale last year of his sister's fatal lung cancer, cigarette makers have survived and prospered. The industry's profits have been healthy for a decade, and in spite of countless lawsuits, no tobacco company has ever paid out a single penny to compensate anyone for damaged health...
...precisely why jubilant anti-smoking forces applauded a remarkable string of confessions by the Liggett Group last week as the straw that could finally break Joe Camel's back. The admissions, made to end Liggett's role as a defendant in 22 state lawsuits against the five largest U.S. tobacco companies, offered an unprecedented peek at some dirty little secrets inside Liggett and, by implication, the rest of the $45 billion tobacco industry...
Liggett, a company with a negative net worth and shrinking business, is the door prosecutors hope to walk through to get at the likes of Philip Morris, the maker of Marlboro, which controls half the tobacco market as the center of a diversified empire. Last year Philip Morris made $6.3 billion worldwide on revenues of $69.2 billion. What excited prosecutors most was the prospect of getting their hands on mountains of documents that Liggett agreed to surrender and that they believe could incriminate all the other cigarette makers. They have already seen a slew of Liggett files, the product...
...attorneys general of the states that won the settlement could hardly contain themselves. "This is the beginning of the end for this conspiracy of lies and deceptions that have been perpetuated on the American public by the tobacco companies," said Arizona's Grant Woods, who brought one of the first state suits that aim to recoup billions of dollars in Medicaid money spent on illnesses related to smoking. Attorney general Hubert ("Skip") Humphrey III of Minnesota emphasized the battles ahead: "This is like busting a street drug dealer to get the Colombia cartel. We are very serious about going ahead...
...ready to cave in, the tobacco giants call the agreement a lot of huffing and puffing and a desperate ploy by Liggett boss Bennett LeBow to cut his losses and possibly force another cigarette maker to buy him out. Liggett's deal is transferable to any acquiring tobacco company except Philip Morris. "The only ones who potentially benefit from LeBow's latest shenanigans are plaintiffs' lawyers," said a joint statement from the four major cigarette makers (Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds, Brown & Williamson Tobacco and Lorillard), who account for 98% of U.S. tobacco sales. Through the first nine months...