For Immediate Release: July 14, 1998

For More Information Contact: TLPJ, 202-797-8600

Minnesotans Mike Ciresi, Roberta Walburn, and State Attorney General Hubert H. Humphrey III Win 1998 Trial Lawyer of the Year Award 

Michael V. Ciresi and Roberta B. Walburn of Robins Kaplan Miller & Ciresi in Minneapolis and Minnesota Attorney General Hubert H. Humphrey III were awarded the 1998 Trial Lawyer of the Year Award by The Trial Lawyers for Public Justice (TLPJ) Foundation at its 16th annual party July 13 in Washington, D.C., for their work on State of Minnesota and Blue Cross and Blue Shield v. Philip Morris Inc., et al. The nationally prestigious award is bestowed annually upon the trial lawyer or lawyers who have made the greatest contribution to the public interest by trying or settling a precedent-setting case.

"These outstanding attorneys offer a powerful example of how trial lawyers play a critical role in addressing and correcting corporate misconduct," said outgoing Foundation President Fred Baron of Baron & Budd in Dallas. "We are proud to honor these exceptional attorneys for their committed work."

Ciresi, Walburn, and Humphrey won $6.6 billion and unprecedented injunctive relief in this settlement, which is a milestone in the battle to hold the tobacco industry accountable for its decades-long campaign to deceive the public. Ciresi and his team sued the industry based on unique theories of liability under consumer protection and antitrust laws.

To achieve this remarkable settlement -- finalized the last day of the 4-month trial's closing arguments -- Ciresi's team reviewed more than 30 million pages of documents, the vast majority of which had never been produced in any tobacco lawsuit, and exposed the industry's concealment of scientific evidence of the link between smoking and disease. Ciresi's team also convinced the judge that 40,000 pages of documents withheld by the industry as attorney-client privileged should be made public, fighting the tobacco companies all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The $6.6 billion damages component of the settlement was the highest per capita against the tobacco industry by any state so far. The settlement also prohibited the industry from marketing cigarettes to children in Minnesota, making material misrepresentations regarding the health effects of tobacco, making contracts or conspiring to suppress information about the health effects of tobacco, marketing tobacco promotional items in Minnesota, and paying to use cigarettes in movies.

In addition, the settlement requires the industry to make previously concealed documents public, to dissolve the Council for Tobacco Research (an organization that actually suppressed findings about the health effects of tobacco), to establish a public health foundation in Minnesota, and to establish a national research account aimed at eliminating the use of tobacco products by children.

Ciresi, Walburn, and Humphrey worked with Richard L. Gill, Corey L. Gordon, Thomas L. Hamlin, John Love, Vincent Moccio, Susan Richard Nelson, Dan O'Fallon, Roman Silberfeld, Tara D. Sutton, Gary L. Wilson, and Martha K. Wivell, all of Robins Kaplan Miller & Ciresi; Lee E. Sheehy, Eric A. Johnson, Thomas F. Pursell, and D. Douglas Blanke, all of the Attorney General's office; and Andrew Czajkowski and Thomas F. Gilde, both of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota.

• The 1998 Public Justice Achievement Award also was presented to the Illinois' Trial Lawyers Association Constitutional Challenge Committee, which coordinated the successful constitutional challenge to Illinois' Tort Reform Act in Best v. Taylor Machine Works, Inc. and Isbell v. Union Pacific Railroad Co. Those honored included ITLA Executive Director Jim Collins and Committee Chair Geoffrey Gifford, both of whom accepted the award on behalf of the committee, along with all of the following: Jon G. Carlson and Eric J. Carlson of Carlson Wendler & Associates in Edwardsville, Illinois; Chicago attorneys Devon C. Bruce and Todd A. Smith of Power, Rogers & Smith; Bruce Kohen and Curt Rodin of Anesi Ozmon & Rodin; Kevin J. Conway of Cooney & Conway; Gary Laatsch of Pavalon & Gifford; Jeffrey M. Goldberg of Jeffrey M. Goldberg & Associates; William J. Harte of William J. Harte, Ltd.; Keith A. Hebeisen of Clifford Law Offices; Bruce R. Pfaff of Bruce R. Pfaff & Associates, Ltd.; Howard Schaffner of Hofeld & Schaffner; Kenneth Chesebro of Cambridge; Jonathan Massey of Washington, D.C.; Ned Miltenberg, Associate General Counsel for ATLA, Washington, D.C.; and Harvard Law School Professor Laurence Tribe.

The litigation team won a major victory for Illinois citizens and created an important precedent for injury victims nationwide by getting Illinois' Tort Reform Act struck down as unconstitutional. In addition to receiving the Public Justice Achievement Award, the team was also named a finalist for the Trial Lawyer of the Year Award.

The other finalists for the 1998 Trial Lawyer of the Year Award were also honored at the gala for their contributions:

•Bernie Bernheim of the Law Offices of Bernie Bernheim in Los Angeles for his work on Taylor v. State Farm Insurance Co.

•Jeffrey P. Foote and Jana Toran of Portland, Oregon for their work on McCathern v. Toyota Motor Co.

•Mark Allen Kleiman of the Law Offices of Mark Allen Kleiman and BethAnne Yeager of the Law Offices of BethAnne Yeager, both of Santa Monica, for their work on Flores v. Phillips College of Los Angeles.

•Allan McGarvey and Roger Sullivan of McGarvey, Heberling, Sullivan & McGarvey in Kalispell, Montana, for their work on In Re Columbia Falls Profit Sharing Litigation.

•Matthew J. Piers and Jonathan A. Rothstein of Chicago's Gessler, Hughes & Socol for their work on Hispanics United v. Village of Addison.