New Jersey Carpenters Health Fund v. Philip Morris, Inc.
United States District Court for the District of New Jersey
17 F. Supp. 2d 324 (1998)
The New Jersey Carpenters Health Fund and other health and welfare trust funds (plaintiffs) sued Philip Morris and other tobacco companies (defendants), alleging the companies fraudulently concealed the health risks and addictiveness of smoking, which induced people to start and keep smoking and drove up the plaintiffs' healthcare costs. The plaintiffs alleged the defendants directed their fraud both at smokers generally and at the plaintiffs specifically, intending the plaintiffs to bear the resulting medical costs, and that the plaintiffs relied on the concealment by not treating smoking-related illness sooner or funding smoking-cessation programs. The defendants moved to dismiss, arguing any harm to the plaintiffs was too remote from their conduct.
Whether a fraudulent-misrepresentation claim can survive a motion to dismiss where the plaintiff's alleged injury stems from misrepresentations directed at the plaintiff itself rather than at third parties whose harms the plaintiff later covers.