Jump to full article: Los Angeles Times, 2005-05-02
Author: From Bloomberg News
Intro: The U.S. Supreme Court breathed new life Monday into a European Union lawsuit that accuses R.J. Reynolds Co. of smuggling cigarettes to avoid paying potentially billions of dollars in taxes, fees and customs duties.
The justices, citing their decision last week in a case raising similar issues, on Monday told a federal appeals court to revisit its conclusion that U.S. judges lack jurisdiction to consider the EU claims.
The justices also told the lower court to reconsider a related bid by 25 Colombian departments, equivalent to U.S. states, to sue units of British American Tobacco and other cigarette makers.
R.J. Reynolds spokesman Seth Moskowitz said the appeals court "should uphold its prior conclusion because that conclusion is consistent with the reasoning the Supreme Court used in the case it cites." . . .
The Colombian complaint says tobacco companies, particularly BAT and its former Brown & Williamson unit, ran a similar system to sneak cigarettes into that country. BAT last year sold Brown & Williamson to Reynolds American Inc., the Winston-Salem, N.C.-based parent of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco.
In throwing out the EU and Colombian lawsuits, the New York-based U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals pointed to the so-called revenue rule
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