Thompson Coburn’s experience in representing the tobacco industry dates back to at least 1957, when Richmond C. Coburn defended R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company in one of the first smoking and health lawsuits in the nation.
During the years since, our attorneys have served as national counsel in hundreds of tobacco lawsuits, taking a wide variety of cases to verdict before juries throughout the country. These trials have included the largest defense jury verdict in the history of tobacco cost recovery litigation, a zero-damages result in a $280 billion civil RICO case brought by the U.S. Department of Justice, a complete defense win in the nation’s first medical monitoring class action tried to verdict, a complete defense jury verdict in a multi-billion-dollar consumer protection class action, trial to successful verdict of a mass consolidation of the personal injury claims of 1,200 individual plaintiffs, and multiple individual smoking and health cases throughout the country, including asbestos and asbestos/synergy lawsuits.
Relatively few firms have been chosen to represent tobacco companies as national counsel because of the extraordinary challenges, complexity, and financial risks that characterize the litigation. Success in this environment requires a depth of experience and mastery of scientific and technical issues; the ability to efficiently and effectively manage large volumes of data; and the skills to advocate with credibility, clarity, focus, and resolve. Our accomplishments reflect the depth of our practice and our ability to create legal teams with a proven track record of meeting our clients’ needs.
