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• Texas tobacco lawyers now file class action in Arkansas over light cigarettes  

Some of the attorneys known as the Texas Tobacco 5 are now involved in new litigation in Arkansas over tobacco company claims regarding light cigarettes.

Beaumont attorney Walter Umphrey and Houston lawyer John Eddie Williams Jr. made millions in legal fees representing the state of Texas against tobacco companies in 1998.

This month they joined Little Rock attorney Thomas P. Thrash as plaintiffs' counsel on a proposed Arkansas class action against several tobacco companies alleging the companies falsified the benefits of smoking light cigarettes.

The proposed class is represented by Little Rock resident David Hunter Williams, who says he switched from regular to light cigarettes as an alternative to quitting smoking. He claims he believed the light cigarettes were less harmful and delivered less tar and nicotine.

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• Altria, Reynolds Sued for ‘Light’ Cigarette Marketing (Update2)  

Altria Group Inc., the largest U.S. tobacco producer, and Reynolds American Inc. were accused in a consumer lawsuit of fraudulent marketing by claiming “light” cigarettes were less harmful than regular cigarettes.

The suit filed by three Tennessee residents on behalf of smokers who bought “light” or “ultra-light” cigarettes in the state since Jan. 1, 2005, seeks class-action, or group, status.

The tobacco companies “have known for decades that filtered and low-tar cigarettes do not offer a meaningful reduction of risk to smokers,” the plaintiffs said in the complaint, filed in Nashville federal court yesterday. “Their marketing, which emphasized reductions in tar and nicotine, was false and misleading.”

The lawsuit is unsuitable for class-action status because a wide array of individual issues prompt people to choose light cigarettes, Jack Marshall, a spokesman at Philip Morris, said in a telephone interview. . . .

Altria and Reynolds were convicted of violating racketeering laws in August 2006 when U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler found the companies conspired for decades to defraud the public by marketing cigarettes as “light” or “low-tar.” The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington in May upheld the conviction that also bars the companies from labeling the cigarettes as “light.” . . .

The case is Alcorn v. Philip Morris USA Inc., Altria Group Inc., R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. and Reynolds American Inc., 09cv0624, U.S. District Court of Middle Tennessee (Nashville).

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