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Suit claims tobacco companies targeted black smokers 

A Coral Gables attorney on Wednesday filed suit against several tobacco companies, accusing them of targeting black consumers.

Attorney J.B. Harris is seeking more than $1 billion in damages on behalf of Gloria Tucker of Coral Springs, a black woman whose mother and grandmother died of health problems related to smoking. Tucker's mother, Dorothy Oliver, died on Nov. 29, 2000. Her grandmother, Annie Mae Swain, died on July 5, 1994.

Citing marketing documents from the tobacco companies, the suit claims they used unflattering generalizations about African-Americans and suggested recruiting black smokers through - among other venues - black churches, night- clubs, and traffic court, where they said 75 percent of the pedestrian traffic on weekdays is black. "In addition to placing into the stream of commerce products that defendants knew or should have known were dangerous and defective, they did so with complete and utter disregard for health and human safety, and in a systematic and deliberate manner meant to addict and ultimately kill as many smokers as possible, especially African-Americans, whose lives were cut short by defendants' reckless and outrageous conduct, including without limitation, the lives of Dorothy Oliver and Annie Mae Swain,'' the lawsuit states.

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