The Nation - News from Nov. 15, 1988

Three cigarette companies used their power and wealth to inflate the cost of a smoker-death lawsuit and now want the plaintiff to pay part of the bill, a lawyer charged. Attorneys for both sides in the landmark Cipollone cigarette trial returned to federal court in Newark, N.J., to argue over payment of about $235,000 for such expenses as transcripts and witnesses’ travel. “It was the defendants’ tremendous power and tremendous wealth that was infused in this case and made it so expensive,” said Cynthia Walters, one of plaintiff Antonio Cipollone’s attorneys. A jury in June ordered Liggett Group Inc. to pay $400,000 to Cipollone, whose wife died of lung cancer after smoking for 40 years. The other defendants, Philip Morris Inc. and Lorillard Inc., were cleared of any responsibility for Rose Cipollone’s death.