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Ailing smokers ask Florida justices to restore $145 billion award TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Sick Florida smokers urged the state's highest court Wednesday to punish the tobacco industry for "fraud and deceit" by restoring a $145 billion class-action award, the largest ever by an American jury. The smokers' lawyers told the Florida Supreme Court to reduce the amount if the justices think it is too large, as long as they also reverse an appeals court decision that overturned the verdict and punitive judgment. "That opinion totally ignores a half-century of fraud and deceit by the tobacco industry," Stanley Rosenblatt told the high court. A tobacco lawyer argued that the original class-action certification was wrong because every smoker is affected differently and should file suits separately rather than in one case. As a class-action, the Miami lawsuit was estimated to include 300,000 to 700,000 ill Floridians. "This case exemplifies the chaos that can result from improperly certified class actions," tobacco lawyer Elliott Scherker told the justices. Rosenblatt and his law partner-wife, Susan, argued that differences for each smoker could be resolved without disturbing the class-action status, and that the common issues for each smoker should not be argued thousands of times. The high court typically takes several months to rule on a case.
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