Appeals Court Rules Smoker Award Was Excessive
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WEST PALM BEACH (CBSMiami/NSF) -- A South Florida appeals court has ruled that the $18.5 million reward in damages against R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company was excessive in a lawsuit filed by the daughter of a woman who died of lung cancer.
A panel of the 4th District Court of Appeal ordered that a circuit judge consider reducing the amount or hold a new trial on damages.
The Palm Beach County case was filed against the tobacco company by Gwendolyn Odom, whose mother, Juanita Thurston, died of lung cancer after smoking cigarettes.
The case is one of thousands in Florida known as "Engle progeny" cases. Such cases are linked to a 2006 Supreme Court ruling that established critical findings about the health dangers of smoking and misrepresentation by cigarette makers.
In the Odom case, a jury found R.J. Reynolds at fault and awarded $6 million in compensatory damages. That amount was reduced to $4.5 million, because Thurston was held to be 25 percent responsible for her illness. The jury also awarded $14 million in punitive damages.
The appeals court said the compensatory-damage award was excessive for a case brought by the adult child of a dead smoker. It rejected the compensatory-damage award and, as an extension, the amount of punitive damages.
"Based on precedent, the jury's award of $6 million in compensatory damages to plaintiff for the loss of her mother was excessive," said the nine-page ruling, written by appeals-court Judge Dorian Damoorgian. "Although the evidence established that plaintiff and her mother had a very close and unique relationship, at the time of Ms. Thurston's illness and death, plaintiff was not living with Ms. Thurston and was not financially or otherwise dependent on her. Instead, plaintiff was married with two children of her own and Ms. Thurston was living with her long-time partner."
The ruling went on to say that although Odom took her mother to many of her appointments and was devastated by her decline and subsequent death, the relationship between an adult child living independent of their parent is simply not the type of relationship which can justify the magnitude of the compensatory damage award.
The News Service of Florida contributed to this report.
