Many of the class action lawsuits against the cigarette companies are going through the states. You may want to check with your state to see if there is a lawsuit pending. Each state government has a website and phone number to call for that sort of information. Then there are the law firms that handle the cases. You may want to do some research to see which law firms are handling the cases. Off hand I know that  Will Ferguson and Associates has handled some cases with Marlboro for the state of New Mexico. Sheller Ludwig and Badey have also handled cases for the residence of Missouri back in 2003.

It is really interesting how many states have been involved in some sort of class action lawsuit with the Philip Morris Company, who makes Marlboro cigarettes. You could check with one of the mentioned law firms like Sheller Ludwig and Badey to see if they know who might have a suit going in your state or if there is any case in action at the supreme court. They often cover multiple states which make sense since they have fought the beast before and won. Your not alone in this fight. In 1996 even the widow of the original Marlboro man filed suite against the company. Actor David McLean died from lung cancer after years of battling the addictive nicotine for years. He just had the hardest time trying to quit smoking and was never successful with it. David McLean was hired to be the Marlboro man on television and print adds for Philip Morris Inc. He was obligated to smoke the cigarettes and would smoke up to five packs per add in order to get the right look. From then on he received boxes of the cigarettes as gifts. At the time, no one would think that the Marlboro man would die from smoking the cigarettes that he was paid to sell to the world.

A federal judge granted class-action status to a lawsuit that could result in up to $200 billion in damages against the major tobacco companies, wire services reported Monday.

The Associated Press and Reuters reported that Judge Jack Weinstein of the U.S. District Court in Brooklyn approved class-action status in the Schwab case. Plaintiffs in the lawsuit say tobacco companies misled smokers into believing so-called light cigarettes are safer than others.

Among the defendants in the case are Winston-Salem-based R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., a subsidiary of Reynolds American Inc. (NYSE: RAI), and Greensboro-based Lorillard Tobacco Co. (NYSE: CG).

David Howard, a spokesman for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco, said his company would appeal the decision and ask the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals to stop proceedings in the case until it had ruled on the appeal.

“We disagree with the judge’s decision to grant class certificatino in this matter,” Howard said. He said that “virtually every smoker of light cigarettes chose their cigarettes for a different reason,” therefore there’s no legal basis to group all lights smokers together.

Other courts around the country, Howard said, have also ruled that lights smokers can’t be grouped together in one class. Weinstein also has a history of certifying class-action claims against the tobacco industry that are reversed on appeal, Howard said.