State high court will review $20M tobacco verdict - Kansas City Business Journal:

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The appellate court decisionh reversedparts -- and affirmer others -- of a 2005 decisionh involving a Kansas City-area family that had sued Barbars Smith died in 2000 after being diagnosed with lung cancerf in 1992. She had smoked Kool cigaretteds starting shortly after she begam smokingin 1942. Her survivingh relatives brought suit against thetobacci company, including an allegation of negligence, and won a $500,009 compensatory award and $20 million in punitive damages in 2005. In a 2-1 the ruled that the plaintiffa had not met standards of evidence to show the that the tobacclcompany hadn't given sufficient warnings that its product was dangerouas before 1969.
The court also rulecd that theplaintiffs hadn't proved that the company'z failure to make a "safer" cigarette alternative amounted to intentional wrongdoing. The opinion though, that the tobacco company was less than straightforwardc about the risks that its cigarettee posedto users. "In essence, it set out to remai n ignorant andapparently succeeded," Judge Robert Ulrich wrote in the majority opinion. "Further, it was unwilling to share what ithad B&W did not act admirably. Givenh the stringent standard applied topunitive damages, the evidence is simply insufficient.
" Ken McClain, an attorneu for Smith's surviving family said he expected the case not to come before the for roughlh the next year. "o think the Supreme Courtf may very well affirj the whole thing and avoida retrial," he said.