WASHINGTON -- The U.S. government asked a federal appeals court to uphold a ruling that Altria Group Inc.'s Philip Morris USA and other U.S. cigarette-makers violated anti-racketeering laws by marketing low-tar cigarettes as healthier alternatives to full-flavored brands.
U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler in Washington issued her 1,653-page decision in August 2006. The manufacturers won a delay of the ruling while they appeal.
"The district court's opinion reveals a decades-long coordinated campaign to deceive American [image-nocss] consumers about the toxicity and addictiveness of cigarettes," the government said in a filing Monday with the appeals court in Washington, according to a report from Bloomberg News.
The government argued that Kessler didn't abuse her discretion when she ordered the cigarette-makers to stop labeling products "light" or "low-tar." It also asked the court to reconsider a decision it made before Kessler's ruling that the cigarette-makers won't have to forfeit "ill-gotten gains" from misrepresenting their products.
The government said the companies intended to defraud consumers and that their actions weren't protected by the Constitution's First Amendment free-speech clause.
Kessler ruled after a nine-month trial ending in 2005 that the cigarette-makers violated U.S. racketeering laws and barred them from violating them in the future. She said they must stop marketing products in packaging or advertising as "light," "low tar," "mild" "natural" or "ultra light."
She ordered them to place full-page ads in more than 30 newspapers across the country containing "corrective statements" regarding the health effects of smoking. She said she lacked the authority to order the companies to fund a smoking-cessation program.
In March, Kessler expanded her decision to rule that the cigarette-makers can't market cigarettes as "light" or "low-tar" overseas. She declined to extend the advertising requirement beyond the United States.
In briefs filed with the appeals court Aug. 10, the tobacco companies argued that they couldn't be found to constitute a racketeering conspiracy under the law and that Kessler applied a wrong legal standard in finding that they were likely to commit future racketeering violations.
They also argued that her judgment conflicted with the Federal Trade Commission's policies and that the labels weren't meant to defraud consumers.
Altria spokesperson Lisa Gonzalez told Bloomberg the company wouldn't comment beyond the court filing.
The lawsuit was filed in 1999. In addition to Philip Morris, the defendants include Reynolds American Inc.'s R.J. Reynolds Tobacco, the Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., Loews Corp.'s Lorillard Tobacco Co. and British American Tobacco PLC's British American Tobacco (Investments) Ltd.
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