Free Republic

LOS ANGELES - California's Supreme Court has affirmed a state appeals court decision to slash in half a $100 million damage award against Philip Morris Inc. in a lawsuit by a smoker who later died of lung cancer. The justices voted 5-0 on Wednesday not to review the decision by a 2nd District Court of Appeal in April, which reduced the damages in the civil trial to $50 million but also let stand $5.5 million in compensatory damages to Richard Boeken. Boeken, a two-pack-a-day smoker since he was 13, died in 2002. He was 57. Attorney Michael Piuze said it...

AUSTIN -- Former Texas Attorney General Dan Morales entered a guilty plea in federal court today to two counts including mail fraud and a tax-related charge. Morales, 46, had pleaded innocent in April to charges that he and Marc Murr, a friend, tried to obtain hundreds of millions of dollars in legal fees for Murr resulting from the state's $17.3 billion settlement with the tobacco industry in 1998. Morales has agreed to a four-year prison term, which has to be accepted by a federal judge, said Daryl Fields, a spokesman for U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton. All other counts against Morales...