Opinion ID: 4519084
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Kerrivan’s Life as a Smoker

Text: Kerrivan remembers seeing cigarette advertisements throughout his childhood. Cigarette advertisements were ubiquitous, appearing on the television in his family home and in the stores where he shopped growing up. According to Kerrivan, “[t]here was always ads someplace for cigarettes.” Doc. 93 at 78. 4 And “[e]verybody seemed to smoke.” Id. at 76. One of his earliest memories was 2 The Tobacco Companies also argue that (1) “application of the Engle findings to establish the conduct elements of the plaintiff’s claims violated their due process rights” and (2) “the claims for strict liability and negligence are preempted by federal law.” Appellant Br. at 16. They concede that our precedent forecloses these arguments and seek only to preserve them for further appellate review. Id.; see also Graham v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., 857 F.3d 1169, 1174, 1178-80 (11th Cir. 2017) (en banc). 3 In describing the facts, we view the evidence in the light most favorable to Kerrivan and draw all reasonable inferences and credibility choices in favor of the jury’s verdict. See Goldsmith v. Bagby Elev. Co., 513 F.3d 1261, 1275 (11th Cir. 2008) (explaining that when we review the denial of a motion for judgment as a matter of law, “[w]e consider all the evidence, and the inferences drawn therefrom, in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party” (internal quotation marks omitted)). 4 “Doc. #” refers to the numbered entry on the district court’s docket. 3 Case: 18-13045 Date Filed: 03/24/2020 Page: 4 of 31 seeing his father rebuke his mother about her smoking habit and imploring her to stop. He was surrounded by smokers, including family members and friends. Joining them, Kerrivan began smoking at the age of 14, and by the age of 20, he was smoking at least a pack of cigarettes every day. Over the years, Kerrivan’s smoking became pervasive. He would smoke “before [his] feet even hit the floor” in the morning, before sleeping at night, and when he awoke during the night to go to the bathroom. Id. at 84-86. He smoked in his car. When allowed, he smoked at work. He smoked even when smoking was not allowed, repeatedly clashing with his daughter—once when he left her wedding rather than comply with a non-smoking policy and another time when she asked him not to smoke in her home because of his grandchild’s presence. Kerrivan smoked several brands of cigarettes over the years: Lucky Strikes in his early years, then Camels for years before he settled on Marlboros of various kinds. He also tried Kool cigarettes because he thought they would be easier on his throat, but he hated their taste and threw them away. As a Marlboro smoker, Kerrivan smoked filtered Marlboro Reds because he believed that the filtered cigarettes would “cut out the tar and nicotine” and that the Tobacco Companies made a lighter cigarette to “make [smoking] easier on [consumers].” Id. at 89; see id. at 83. He saw commercials concerning filtered cigarettes that were consistent with this view. At one point, Kerrivan began 4 Case: 18-13045 Date Filed: 03/24/2020 Page: 5 of 31 smoking Marlboro Lights to try to quit smoking. Instead of helping him quit, the reduced amount of tar and nicotine made him crave cigarettes more; he increased his habit to smoking two packs a day. Another time, he tried Marlboro Ultra Lights, believing that they would make it easier for him to quit smoking. Again, the lower tar and nicotine had the opposite effect: They led Kerrivan to smoke three packs a day because he “was getting nothing out of the cigarette.” Id. at 83. After approximately 30 years as a smoker, in 1993 Kerrivan was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (“COPD”). He then redoubled his efforts to quit. These efforts resulted in panic attacks and a prescription for Xanax to alleviate his withdrawal symptoms. Only after his doctor diagnosed him with double walking pneumonia in 2006—and warned that he would die in six months if his smoking continued—did Kerrivan finally succeed in putting smoking behind him. Twenty years have passed since Kerrivan first was diagnosed with COPD. His life has changed substantially since his diagnosis. He currently suffers from “severe[,] end-stage” COPD. Doc. 78 at 230. COPD forced him to transition from his active job as a tow truck driver to a desk job as a dispatcher. Now, his poor health prevents him from working at all, even though he would prefer to work. He can no longer build race cars as he did before his illness. He cannot do anything without using his oxygen tank. Basic activities such as showering exhaust him. 5 Case: 18-13045 Date Filed: 03/24/2020 Page: 6 of 31 When he sleeps, he struggles to breathe due to his oxygen tank’s tubing sometimes slipping from his nose. Believing, based on his doctor’s advice, that another bout of pneumonia would kill him, Kerrivan keeps himself away from other people. Even so, he lives his life constantly in and out of the emergency room. Kerrivan described quitting smoking as “the hardest thing [he] ever had to do in [his] life.” Doc. 93 at 96. If he had known how harmful cigarettes were and how hard it would be to quit smoking, he never would have started smoking. He never thought that the Tobacco Companies would sell him a product that could cause harm to the extent he has suffered. 2. Conspiracy to Conceal Effects of Nicotine Cigarettes The evidence presented at the jury trial on Kerrivan’s claims showed that the tobacco industry, including the Tobacco Companies here, conspired to conceal and misrepresent information about the addictiveness of nicotine and the serious health risks caused by smoking cigarettes. Industry members agreed to attack the sources of health warnings and to cast doubt on the connection between smoking and disease. At the same time, the tobacco industry pretended to be on a crusade to confirm the safety of its products, promising the American public that it would report the discovery of anything harmful. The industry’s intent was not just to hide the truth but to create enough doubt about the adverse health effects of smoking to give addicted smokers an excuse to keep smoking. 6 Case: 18-13045 Date Filed: 03/24/2020 Page: 7 of 31 The industry’s efforts also included design features, such as added filters, that undermined a smoker’s ability to quit smoking. The Tobacco Companies began marketing filtered cigarettes to the public as a safer alternative, concealing the fact that smokers of filtered cigarettes actually ingested more tar and other carcinogens than those who smoked unfiltered cigarettes. They also hid that the design of filtered cigarettes purposefully increased the dose of nicotine, which increased the addictiveness of the cigarettes, in turn increasing sales. Further, despite knowing for decades that smoking nicotine cigarettes was addictive and caused serious diseases such as COPD, cigarette manufacturers, including the Tobacco Companies, never publicly admitted these facts until the late 1990s, well after Kerrivan was diagnosed with COPD.