Odds Getting Worse Wall Street analysts and legal pundits find many reasons for this change in the legal landscape. The sheer number of cases now pending against the industry increases their chance of a loss. By the end of last year, RJ Reynolds was facing 664 smoker lawsuits. That's up from just 134 in 1995. The industry has been unable to run from the damning statements in their own documents.
Whistleblowers prove to be powerful witnesses on the stand.
Plaintiffs' lawyers are putting together better cases and finding better juries to hear them. But there may be more to these verdicts. They may be the result of a public perception that legislators are unable or unwilling to take on the tobacco industry. Like the gun industry, tobacco has a powerful lobby in Congress and in states that successfully thwart regulation. Their products were made intentionally exempt from regulation by the Consumer Product Safety Commission when it was formed.