(Closing shares.)
Jump to full article: Bloomberg News, 2001-02-28
Intro: A Marshall Islands judge has dismissed ten of 11 claims brought by the republic's government against Philip Morris Cos. and other U.S. tobacco companies in an effort to recoup expenses resulting from smoking-related diseases.
In the ruling last week, High Court Judge H. Dee Johnson said there was only enough evidence for one of the claims brought against the companies, a claim under the republic's consumer protection laws. . .
The suit had been seeking $4.6 billion in damages, which had the potential to be trebled. That dollar figure was the lawsuit's downfall, wrote Johnson in the decision.
``When applied to a small country of some 50,000 souls, it is breath-taking,'' wrote Johnson. ``These astronomical numbers badly damaged the credibility of the (Marshall Islands) in the public eye, in both the legal and political arenas.''
Seeking such a large sum made it look like the Marshall Islands was ``trying to use its own court system to extort these huge sums of money from the defendants,'' Johnson said.
Jump to full article » |