Filed under: News, Race and Civil Rights
The North Carolina-based tobacco firm was generous enough to hand out free samples of its cigarettes to black children in the late 1950s.
And this week, the company awarded $71 million in compensatory damages to a family dealing with the devastating affects of lung cancer.
That's right.
The family of Marie Evans (pictured at age 10), who died of lung cancer at age 54 after smoking for 40 years, was able to persuade a jury that Lorillard was trying to hook black kids on tobacco by handing out free Newports, Old Gold and Mavericks in order to build a lifelong following.
Can you imaging that? A tobacco company targeting people just so it could make money?
That would make it akin to drug dealers, who give out a free taste of a high to hook a newbie and bring them into the drug life.
In videotaped testimony given to her lawyers before she died, Evans said cigarettes "seemed to be always available" and that she tried to quit about 50 times but couldn't.
No one put a gun to Evans' head to force her to smoke, and we all know that people have to use their own good sense to protect their health.
Lorillard's targeting of young people, though, when they are impressionable and vulnerable, was dirty.
Cigarette companies had the research to back up the addictive nature of tobacco. They knew a certain percentage of poor people would become loyal customers for life, even if those lives were cut short in the process.
I'm not sure whether Lorillard should have to pay $71 million to one family since so many families were affected. A judge will probably reduce the jury award, as is common with these types of cases.
Even so, I think businesses can learn a valuable lesson for the jury verdict -- don't fight dirty when marketing your product.
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