$50 Million Award in Smoker's Case Stands

The Supreme Court refused yesterday to consider tossing out an award of $50 million in damages to the family of a two-pack-a-day smoker who died of cancer.

Philip Morris USA, which controls about half the U.S. cigarette market, had asked the justices to declare the award unconstitutionally excessive and to rule that the company should have been shielded from some of the smoker's claims.

The justices declined to review the case, without comment.

Richard Boeken, who initially won $3 billion in punitive damages, was 57 when he died in 2002, a year after a California jury found the tobacco company guilty of negligence, misrepresentation, fraud and selling a defective product.

The damages award was reduced to $100 million and then was cut in half by an appeals court.

Attorneys for Boeken's family had asked justices to consider what they called "Philip Morris's immensely reprehensible, immensely profitable fraud scheme perpetuated for decades."

Philip Morris lawyer Andrew Frey told the justices that the company did not conceal information about low-tar cigarettes. The company, which is part of Altria Group Inc., wanted the high court to use the case to clarify the formula for deciding punitive damages.

Three years ago, the Supreme Court said punitive awards should be "reasonable and proportionate to the amount of harm" suffered. The justices did not give a specific formula, and lower courts have been conflicted in handling follow-up cases.

Boeken's case involved a highly addicted smoker who took up the habit at 13 and tried to quit using classes, hypnosis and nicotine gum. He switched to Marlboro Lights in the belief that they were safer. He smoked even in his final days.

The cases are Philip Morris USA v. Boeken , No. 05-594, and Boeken v. Philip Morris Inc. , No. 05-600.