By John Schwartz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 27, 1998; Page A07

ST. PAUL, Minn., Jan. 26—The tobacco industry "waged a decades-long campaign" to protect its profits by deceiving the American public about the dangers of smoking, a lawyer charged today as he opened the state of Minnesota's closely watched lawsuit against cigarette makers.

The state has gathered an unprecedented collection of 33 million pages of internal industry documents that would prove, in "their own secret words," that "the companies waged a decades-long campaign of deceit and misrepresentation . . . in the name of profit," said Michael Ciresi, representing Minnesota and the Blue Cross/Blue Shield insurance company.

After Ciresi's more than two-hour presentation, attorneys for the tobacco companies disputed his claims and said the state and insurer were making arguments that didn't address the issues the jury would actually have to decide.

"They are attempting to appeal to your passions," said John Monica, a lawyer for Lorillard Inc., but "this is a case, a lawsuit, about money."

Minnesota is one of 41 states that have filed lawsuits against the tobacco industry, in part to recover billions of dollars they have spent treating the health problems of sick smokers. The lawsuits are among the most threatening in a wave of litigation that has prompted cigarette makers to seek a national settlement.

In recent months, the industry has agreed to pay billions of dollars to the states of Florida, Mississippi and Texas to settle their cases. But Minnesota's case, the first to come to trial, is considered the most threatening because it has been the most aggressive in gathering sensitive industry documents, which could prove damaging in other cases and make it difficult for the industry to get Congress to approve a national settlement.

During his opening remarks, Ciresi quietly laid out the documents and evidence that he planned to use to make his case. Ciresi wove the contents of previously released and never-before-seen documents into a narrative that he said would show "what these defendants knew about the harm of smoking, when they knew it and what they did with that information."

The industry, he said, often argues that it manufactures a legal product. Ciresi said, however, that "this case is about the illegal sale of a legal product," illegal because the companies lied about the risks and about nicotine's addictiveness, and marketed their products to minors.

With the courtroom overflowing with spectators, journalists and industry analysts, the jury, made up of three smokers, seven former smokers and two people who have never smoked, listened attentively, carefully reading the documents that popped up before them on strategically placed video screens.

Ciresi cited a document from Hill & Knowlton, the public relations firm that helped the companies formulate their strategy to "reassure the public" that the science on smoking and health was still not settled. The industry, Ciresi said, "chose darkness while their publicists proclaimed they were pursuing truth." By 1964, the companies had entered into what a Philip Morris Inc. top scientist would later call a "gentlemen's agreement" to avoid in-house research linking smoking to disease.

The companies had a deep understanding of the addictive nature of nicotine and how to maximize its effects in tobacco products, Ciresi said. As an attorney for the Kansas City law firm of Shook, Hardy & Bacon wrote in one document, "We can't defend smoking as a free choice if the person was addicted."

While the youth marketing efforts of R.J. Reynolds have come to light in recent weeks, Ciresi laid out documents showing similar efforts on the part of Philip Morris and Lorillard. The documents showed research on teenagers as young as 14, and a 1981 Philip Morris document said, "Today's teenager is tomorrow's potential regular customer."

In his opening statement, attorney Peter Bleakley, representing Philip Morris, argued that the case really came down to a single issue that had nothing to do with the allegations of deceit and conspiracy: "whether the state or Blue Cross will be able to prove that they incurred increased health care costs," in the specific programs cited by the state, because of the industry's actions.

Bleakley said his clients understand that "some of you don't like cigarette companies very much," but asked the jurors, "Please keep an open mind and remember what this case is about."

Whatever the companies might have said or done, Bleakley said, does not change the fact that the risks of smoking have long been known -- not just for decades, but for centuries. Christopher Columbus noted that once people started using tobacco, it was nearly impossible to stop. By the time of the 1964 surgeon general's report linking tobacco to lung cancer, he insisted, "Virtually everybody in Minnesota believed that cig smoking was harmful."

No smoker "has been deceived, misled by any improper conduct of the tobacco companies." He also said the companies would show that "smokers do not cost the programs any more money than nonsmokers."

The state and the insurer are asking for $1.77 billion in actual damages from the industry. But a finding against the industry could lead to a much higher judgment. If the jury finds that the companies violated the state's antitrust laws, they could be forced to pay triple damages. And the judge has also said he will allow Minnesota to ask the jury to assess punitive damages, which could send the final total even higher.

The state and the tobacco companies have engaged in settlement discussions, and Minnesota Attorney General Hubert H. Humphrey III said yesterday that he was still open to discussion as long as the companies "stop marketing to the kids," release all internal documents and pay a price "commensurate with the harm."