Federal Judge, Glady's Kessler, has found Philip Morris, RJ Reynolds, Brown & Williamson, British American Tobacco and Lorillard Tobacco guilty of misleading the public about the harmful consequences of smoking to human health. Kessler said it was evident that smoking causes disease, suffering and death. The ruling stated that despite internal recognition of this fact, defendants have publicly denied, distorted, and minimized the hazards of smoking for decades.

However, the companies will not face any fines or have to pay for anti-smoking programmes. All they will have to do is make sure they do not deceive the public again.

The Clinton administration, in 1999, accused the tobacco industry of fraud and conspiracy. In the same year a judgement made the industry pay $264 billion towards the medical costs that arose as a result of smoking. During that trial, companies were accused of silently agreeing not to criticise each others' brands. In other words, never saying one brand was more or less damaging to health than the other. This agreement, said the prosecutors, meant that the tobacco companies never had to talk about the harmful effects of smoking.

Even though anti-tobacco campaigners have called this a victory, financially the ruling is of no consequence for the industry. As a result of this ruling, tobacco company shares went up.

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