West Virginia jury to decide controversial tobacco case

WHEELING, W.Va.- Tobacco companies have been forced to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on the medical bills of dead or dying smokers.

They've had to spend millions more on ad campaigns to discourage young people from smoking.

And now, in a precedent-setting case, a West Virginia jury will decide whether the industry should be forced to spend as much as $500 million on doctors' exams for healthy people who, despite the warnings, kept on smoking.

Jury selection started in state court yesterday in a trial that is expected to take 3 1/2 months.

It is the first time a class-action lawsuit demanding a tobacco company pay for preventive medical monitoring has made it to trial in the United States.

Twelve other cases have been filed around the country since 1996, according to a Jeff Furr, an attorney for R.J. Reynolds. Ten of the 13 were denied class-action status and dismissed. One, in Nevada, is still under review. A Louisiana case has been granted class-action status but is not expected to go to trial until the summer.

Lawyers representing more than 250,000 West Virginians covered by the lawsuit said the five cigarette manufacturers and two distributors being sued should provide free periodic medical tests for smokers who are currently healthy but at risk of contracting various cancers and lung or heart disease.

The defendants include Reynolds; Philip Morris; Brown & Williamson; and Lorillard.