MS 10.30-12.00 Main sessions

LITIGATION IN FINLAND

The trials against the tobacco industry were started in Finland in the year 1988. The first proceeding was a case of product liability, in which the plaintiff claimed for damages for throat cancer, emphysema and chronic bronchitis. The man in question had smoked cigarettes since he was 16 years old for 45 years (1941-1986); he died in 1992. The claim for product liability was accepted in the Consumer Complaint Board in a plenum session in 1991, but it was overruled by the City Court in 1992. The case is now in the Appeal Court, where it will be settled, as soon as the handling of the later described criminal case of perjury has ended in the City Court.

We have also a criminal case trial pending against the representatives of the tobacco industry for endangerment and marketing crimes among others. The lower court rejected the indictments in 1993; even this case is waiting in the Appeal Court.

Since 1994 we have had an indictment for perjury being handled in the Helsinki City Court against a Helsinki university professor of anatomy, who told the court as witness of the tobacco industry in the product liability case that medical science has not proven that cigarettes cause any illnesses. This case is expected to end in the City Court by the end of this year.

Finland has a Product Liability Law, which has come into effect on a September 1, 1991. The Parliament included even tobacco products to the ones covered by the law. As soon as the above cases have received legal force, new cases shall be driven against the tobacco companies based on this new law.

Smoke Free Europe Conference Abstracts - 19 SEP 1996

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