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HOW TO PROSECUTE TOBACCO SELLERS
FOR THE TOBACCO HOLOCAUST

Table of Contents
  1. The Tobacco Holocaust
  2. Laws on Prosecuting Officials for Not Prosecuting
  3. The International Criminal Court's Jurisdiction
  4. Deaths Caused By Smoking
  5. Transnational Tobacco Companies
  6. Deceit and Duplicity of the Tobacco Industry
  7. The Death Toll from Tobacco as a Crime Against Humanity
  8. No Escaping Liability
  9. Michigan Precedents
10. References

1. The Tobacco Holocaust

By 1836, it was well-established "that thousands and tens of thousands die of diseases of the lungs generally brought on by tobacco smoking. . . . How is it possible to be otherwise? Tobacco is a poison. A man will die of an infusion of tobacco as of a shot through the head." —Samuel Green, New England Almanack and Farmer's Friend (1836).

Tobacco smoke kills due to its massive number and quantities of toxic chemicals. Their nature, use, and impact constitutes "ultrahazardous activity." Tobacco hazards have been known by doctors for over a century. Note also how long has been known data on, for example, the tobacco-cancer link, and the increased premature death rate. Just one essential unlawful aspect alone is a sufficient "element of illegality" to render the whole unlawful. See also our overview of tobacco effects.

How Doctors Know Cigarette Effects

The U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare, National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), book entitled Research on Smoking Behavior, Research Monograph 17, Publication ADM 78-581, p v (December 1977), said:

"Over 37 million people (one of every six Americans alive today) will die from cigarette smoking years before they otherwise would."

A few years earlier, the Royal College of Physicians of London, in its book, Smoking and Health Now (London: Pitman Medical and Scientific Publishing Co, 1971), p 9, had already declared the smoking-caused death toll to be a "holocaust" due to the then "annual death toll of some 27,500." If 27,500 deaths is a "holocaust," and it is, 37 million is (in contrast to the Nazi 6 million holocaust), a six fold+ holocaust. Thirty-seven million is above the World War II "crimes against humanity" level for which prosecutions occurred in the late 1940's.

Then, a special ad hoc court was convened to try the accused. Now for trying "crimes against humanity," a permanent court exists, the International Criminal Court (ICC). This website focuses on providing data to support action to bring to trial in that court, tobacco operatives and sellers on charges of killing their customers. (This website is impartial; such trials can of course occur in any criminal court, it is not essential that trials of tobacco sellers occur only in the ICC).

"Smoking Causes 4.83 Million Deaths Globally," says the Center for Substance Abuse Research, in 12 CESAR FAX (Issue #44) 3 November 2003.

At The Nurnberg Trial, 6 FRD 69 (1946), aka the Nuremberg Trial, government officials and businessmen were convicted after World War II of using legal products (guns, carbon monoxide, etc.) to kill large numbers of people. That a product is "legal" (e.g., bullets) does not mean that one can kill with it! There is no statute of limitations on murder.

See also Application of Yamashita, 327 US 1; 66 S Ct 340-379; 90 L Ed 499 (1946), and Application of Honmo, 327 US 759; 66 S Ct 515-517; 90 L Ed 992 (1946) (cases holding government officials liable for acts of subordinates, and imposing death penalty for those acts). (Ramifications of these cases are discussed in some depth by David Bergamini (1928-1983), Japan's Imperial Conspiracy (New York: Morrow, 1971), pp 1349-1354).

A similar culpability concept applies in the private sector, United States v Park, 421 US 658, 672; 95 S Ct 1903; 44 L Ed 2d 489 (1975) (holding private sector official criminally liable for subordinates' acts).

2. Laws on Prosecuting Officials for Not Prosecuting

The subject of "Exporting tobacco addiction from the USA," has appeared in an eminent medical journal twice, in 351 Lancet (#9116) 1597 (30 May 1998) and 352 Lancet (#9122) 152 (11 July 1998). See also John Britton, "Tobacco: The Epidemic We Could All Avoid," 52 Thorax 1021-1022 (1997). Prof. John I. D. Hinds was saying this in 1882, in The Use of Tobacco (Nashville, Tenn: Cumberland Presbyterian Publishing House, 1882), p 49.

Government officials, prosecutors, and police can themselves be prosecuted for their being accessory to tobacco operatives' murder via two ways:
  • (a) by adopting unlawful laws, i.e., laws not conforming to extant higher law, and
  • (b) by non-enforcement of already existing laws, e.g., those against poisoning and murder.

    • For example, in the U.S., a Michigan law MCL § 767.39, MSA § 28.979, treats "accessories" as "principals." A second law, MCL § 750.478, MSA § 28.476, makes it unlawful for government officials to NOT enforce the laws. "In Michigan, violation of a statute is negligence per se," Thaut v Finley, 50 Mich App 611; 213 NW2d 820, 821 (1973).

    Each pertinent government and corporate official, has "by reason of his position . . . responsibility and authority either to prevent in the first instance, or promptly to correct, the violation" (of whatever type occurs) so "if he [the official] does not will the violation, [he] usually is in a position to pevent it," United States v Park, 421 US 658; 95 S Ct 1903; 44 L Ed 2d 489 (1975); Yamashita, supra. When officials violate the law and others knowingly refuse to prosecute the violations by enforcing the law, they are negligent, and deemed to also want the deaths to occur, i.e., "accessories" (thus "principals") to the crime.

    One convicted police officer learned this principle the hard way, upon being arrested and convicted in the case of United States v Luteran, 93 F2d 395 (CA 8, 1937). Here in Michigan, two police officers who had never enforced the Michigan cigarette control law, resulting in a Mr. Green becoming a cocaine addict, whom they were prosecuted for killing, were themselves recently jailed for some years.

    TCPG's Analysis of That Case

    In another case, United States v Sheriff Goins, 593 F2d 88 (CA 8, 1979), a sheriff was convicted of crime related to not enforcing a tobacco-related law. As The Nurnberg Trial, 6 FRD 69 (1946), shows, such arrests can be just around the corner, as most if not all nations have such type laws.

    See a parallel 2013 case, “Genocide in Guatemala: The Conviction of [President] Efrain Rios Montt” (15 May 2013). The court ruled that he, as a political leader, “was aware of everything that was happening, and did not stop it, despite having the power to stop it,” referring, for example, to some 1,700 deaths caused 30 years before, in the 1982-1983 period. His defense (“I never authorised it, I never signed, I never proposed, I never ordered that race, ethnicity or religion to be attacked. I never did it!”) did not prevail since "despite having the power to stop it,” he “did not stop it.” He did not exercise "foresight and vigilance."   See also Steve Weissman, "Indicting Reagan, Israel, and the God Squads in the Guatemalan Holocaust" (14 May 2013) (describes the importance of following the evidence developed at Montt's trial, and holding accountable all of the "never indicted foreign co-conspirators," who were complicit in the Mayan holocaust in Guatemala).

    3. The International Criminal Court's Jurisdiction

    On 17 July 1998 the United Nations Rome Statute of The International Criminal Court established the goal of having a permanent Court having power to exercise jurisdiction over persons for the most serious crimes of international concern. Article 5 confers jurisdiction on the International Criminal Court with respect to the following crimes:

    (a) The crime of genocide;
    (b) Crimes against humanity;
    (c) War crimes;
    (d) The crime of aggression.

    For the purposes of the Statute, Article 7 defines a "crime against humanity" to mean any of the following acts when committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directly against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack:

    (a) Murder;

    (b) Extermination;

    (c) Enslavement;

    (d) Deportation or forcible transfer of population;

    (e) Imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty
    in violation of fundamental rules of international law;

    (f) Torture;

    (g) Rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced
    pregnancy, enforced sterilization, or any other form of
    sexual violence of comparable gravity;

    (h) Persecution against any identifiable group or
    collectively on political, racial, national ethnic, cultural,
    religious, gender as defined in paragraph 3, or
    other grounds that are universally recognized
    as impermissible under international law, in
    connection with any act referred to in this paragraph
    or any crime within the jurisdiction of the Court;

    (i) Enforced disappearance of persons;

    (j) The crime of apartheid;

    (k) Other inhumane acts of a similar character
    intentionally causing great suffering,
    or serious injury to body
    or to mental or physical health.

          At minimum, definitions (a), (b), (c), (f) and (k) apply as tobacco causes suffering, abulia (mental enslavement due to "addiction"), and unlawful death. The typical protracted death process is often torturous and produces a vast amount of "great suffering" and "serious injury to body or to mental or physical health" including desperate self-medication efforts at relief via alcoholism, bodily injury and suffering of such extreme as even leading to mass numbers of suicides, the killing of nonsmokers via lung cancer and heart disease, the killing of children via SIDS, a significant amount of Alzheimer's disease, much of the AIDS epidemic, and significant numbers of abortions. For a current list, see our homepage.

    Premeditation is shown by the deceit and duplicity of the tobacco industry worldwide. So the death toll from tobacco clearly constitutes crime against humanity susceptible of prosecution in the International Criminal Court.

    See also International Human Rights Law Context (21 June 2013).

    4. Deaths Caused By Smoking

    Local and area health departments provide health data for their jurisdictions. The World Health Organization (WHO) provides data on health issues on an international basis. Some of its voluminous data is posted at its tobacco website.

    For example, it estimates that there are about 1.1 billion smokers in the world out of a total population of around 5.8 billion. Of these, 50% will die prematurely from tobacco related illness, half in middle age with an average loss of life expectancy of 20 - 25 years (8 years over all ages). This means that over half a billion people (in excess of 500 million) or about 10% of the existing population will die from smoking - 27% from lung cancer, 24% from heart disease, 23% from chronic obstructive lung disease, emphysema or bronchitis and the remaining 26% from other diseases including other circulatory disease (18%) and other cancers (8%). The slowness of the deaths leads to known foreseeable protracted suffering and suicide, and thus corroborates "premeditation" as defined in law.

    Currently, 3 million people worldwide die every year from smoking related disease. This represents about 1 person every ten seconds—the worst "ultrahazardous" impact ever.

    “The tobacco industry is the greatest killing organization in the world. The harm done by all the armies in the world combined, will not begin to equal the damage inflicted upon the human race by the combined activity of the cultivators, manufacturers, and distributors of tobacco.”—Dr. Jesse M. Gehman, Smoke Over America (East Aurora, N.Y: The Roycrofters, 1943), p 216.

    "Tobacco alone is predicted to kill a billion people this [21st] century, 10 times the toll it took in the 20th century, if current trends hold," says the Associated Press article, "Tobacco could kill 1B this century," The Detroit News, p 4A (11 July 2006). Details are at "American Cancer Society CEO Urges United States to Do More to Win Global War Against Cancer in Address to National Press Club" (26 June 2006).

    "Tobacco producers are "terrorists", Seffrin tells Israel Cancer Association," The Jerusalem Post (31 March 2005): "All those involved in the production and marketing of tobacco products are 'terrorists', declared Dr John Seffrin, president of the American Cancer Society and elected president of Geneva-based International Union Against Cancer (UICC)."

    Skull of a Skeleton with Burning Cigarette
    Vincent van Gogh, 1885-1886

    One third of all people aged fifteen years and up smoke. The perpetrators are increasing this percentage in Asia, Eastern Europe and the former Soviet States. Consumption trends indicate that smoking prevalence is reducing in developed countries (DCs) (down 1.5% per annum in the United States) while increasing in lesser developed countries (LDCs) (up 1.7% per annum on average).

    Based on current trends, WHO estimates the death toll from smoking will rise to 10 million people per year by 2025. Currently two million deaths occur each year in developed countries and 1 million deaths occur each year in lesser developed countries. By 2025, this ratio will alter to 3 million deaths per year in developed countries and 7 million deaths per year in lesser developed countries.

    For example,
    "Tobacco caused about 0.6 million Chinese deaths in 1990 (0.5 million men). This will rise to 0.8 million in 2000 (0.4 million at ages 35-69) or to more if the tobacco attributed fractions increase. . . . At current age specific death rates in smokers and non-smokers one in four smokers would be killed by tobacco, but as the epidemic grows this proportion will roughly double. If current smoking uptake rates persist in China (where about two thirds of men but few women become smokers) tobacco will kill about 100 million of the 0.3 billion males now aged 0-29, with half these deaths in middle age and half in old age." See Bo-Qi Liu, Richard Peto, Zheng-Ming Chen, Jillian Boreham, Ya-Ping Wu, Jun-Yao Li, T Colin Campbell, Jun-Shi Chen, "Emerging tobacco hazards in China: 1. Retrospective proportional mortality study of one million deaths," 317 Brit Med J 1411-1422 ( 21 Nov 1998).

    Tobacco pushers were targeting China, including
    children, for tobacco sales as long ago as 1914.

    A "prospective study and the [above] retrospective study show that by 1990 smoking was already causing about 12% of Chinese male mortality in middle age. This proportion is predicted to rise to about 33% by 2030." See Shi-Ru Niu, Gong-Huang Yang, Zheng-Ming Chen, Jun-Ling Wang, Gong-Hao Wang, Xing-Zhou He, Helen Schoepff, Jillian Boreham, Hong-Chao Pan, Richard Peto, "Emerging tobacco hazards in China: 2. Early mortality results from a prospective study," 317 Brit Med J 1423-1424 (21 Nov 1998).

    No other consumer product in the history of the world has come even close to inflicting this degree of harm on the world community. If anything else posed a threat to life of this magnitude whether human induced or naturally occurring - be it world war, genocide, ethnic cleansing, natural disaster or disease - it would demand immediate international action. The responses to war crimes (both current and dating back to World War II), germ warfare, nuclear weapons, HIV or even climate change are but a few examples.

    5. Transnational Tobacco Companies

    Tobacco consumed by the world's 1.1 billion smokers is produced by a handful of transnational tobacco companies and a number of state owned manufacturers. China's state owned production accounts for 31% of all tobacco sales with Italy, Russia, Japan, Taiwan, Indonesia and Thailand, amongst other countries, having substantial government owned factories as well.

    Transnational tobacco companies account for 40% of the global market and control 70% of world production, and this is increasing. In many cases, the state owned producer was a state monopoly but, increasingly, this has been broken down through free trade agreements to a point where transnational tobacco companies are not only marketing in countries previously the subject of a state monopoly but there are reports of expressions of interest by transnational tobacco companies in obtaining an interest in formerly state owned monopolies now being privatized.

    The major transnational tobacco companies, in order of sales, are: U.S. based Philip Morris Inc., followed by British based BAT Industries p.l.c., United States based RJR Nabisco and Rothmans. Under agreements apparently reached among these transnational tobacco companies, Rothmans does not market in the United States, and BAT does not market in Britain.

    There are reports that Philip Morris and BAT have entered into collusive agreements that fix cigarette prices and divide markets in South America (apparently such anti-competitive arrangements are not illegal in those countries). It is a mark of the power of the major transnational tobacco companies that they can reach such agreements dividing up markets in sovereign nations, inflicting the "natural and probable consequences" above cited.

    Globally, tobacco revenues total US $250 billion or roughly equivalent to the GDP of Australia. In 1996, Philip Morris had annual revenues of US $55 billion, just over half from tobacco with the rest coming from domestic and international food and alcohol sales. Only 18% was from domestic tobacco sales (20% in 1992) compared with 35% from international sales (21% in 1992). Total tobacco sales comprised 53% in 1996 (41% in 1992) or about US $23 billion. BAT revenue in 1996 was US $23 billion. RJR Nabisco had total revenues of US $17 billion in 1996 of which 48% or about US $8 billion was from tobacco sales.

    These massive levels of turnover and the economic, political and social influence of the transnational tobacco companies has led to the industry being described collectively as "Big Tobacco." A comparison is made that these revenues exceed the gross domestic product of many countries. For example, Philip Morris has a turnover larger than the GDP of Ecuador, Guatemala, Kenya, Kuwait, Malaysia or Peru. It is roughly the equivalent of Ireland, Singapore or Hungary. RJR Nabisco's turnover is roughly the equivalent of the GDP of Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, El Salvador, Lebanon or Jamaica.

    Says the Royal College of Physicians, "the international tobacco industry is attempting to ensure that as many people as possible take up this potentially lethal habit."—Fred Pearce, "Britain exports the smoking holocaust," New Scientist (1 Dec 1983), p 642.

    6. Deceit and Duplicity of the Tobacco Industry

    The current status of the tobacco industry is anomalous insofar as cigarette consumption clearly inflicts a degree of mortality at odds with fundamental human rights and human values and laws. The tobacco industry defends itself on the basis that tobacco is a "legal product." But as shown at Nuremberg, the fact that a product is legal, does not allow its use to kill. ("Legality" merely lulls perpetrators).

    Tobacco kills; it is a "lethal product." That it continues to be sold is because the tobacco industry had already acquired a substantial degree of economic, political and social influence by the time the link between smoking and disease was established. Since then, the tobacco industry worldwide has engaged in a deliberate, premeditated campaign of deceit and duplicity to foreseeably continue and even expand its the death rate through a process of denial and disputation of the link between smoking and disease, the addictive, enslaving, properties of nicotine, and their marketing strategies directed at youth.

    The deceit and duplicity is currently being exposed by litigation in the U.S. which is spreading worldwide. Continued tobacco sales confirm premeditation, particularly in view of the projected increase in tobacco deaths by the year 2025. This is all the more so given the disparity in the projected increase between developed and lesser developed countries, reflecting an exploitation of lesser developed countries to offset liabilities the tobacco industry is incurring in the U.S.

    This premeditated circumstance calls for international action. It must not be allowed to happen, this crime against humanity.

    7. The Death Toll from Tobacco
        as a Crime Against Humanity

    The jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court contained in Article 5, including the definition of a "crime against humanity' as contained in Article 7 (set out above), means that the operatives and accessories of tobacco companies are at risk of being charged with a "crime against humanity" due to the death toll from tobacco. Indeed, showing that the deaths are "natural and probable consequences," the deaths are projected to increase from 3 million to about 10 million a year by the year 2025. Also note the predicted dramatic increase in lesser developed countries from 1 million a year to 7 million a year. It is impossible to describe such a consequence as anything other than the result of an inhumane act of a character meeting standard legal definitions of murder, including of the "first degree" (premeditated) causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against the civilian population of the world.

    Given what is known about smoking and disease, the deceit and duplicity of the tobacco industry, and given that the operatives of tobacco companies and their accessories have knowledge of the "natural and probable consequences" of their activities, they, and their governmental and local accessories, must face the prospect of such charges in the International Criminal Court. The consequences of conviction include penalties of imprisonment, fines and forfeiture of assets (Article 77). Provision is also make for reparations to victims (Article 75). Some nations of course have capital punishment. The Nuremberg precedent of executions for far fewer numbers of killings must also be taken into account.

    Example: "China marked World Anti-Narcotics Day . . . by executing 58 drug traffickers."--"Traffickers killed to mark no-drug day," Detroit Free Press, p 5A (29 June 1999).
    The next step is to recognize that tobacco pushers are drug pushers too, and pertinent precedents on murder, then begin their trials, convictions, executions. Any nation having its people killed by tobacco pushers can begin the process.

    Current laws against poisoning and murder are of course ancient and already in effect, re which there is no statute of limitations. Each corporate and government defendant would foreseeably be "charged with [disregarding] the duty to see to it that . . . life was not endangered . . . To constitute murder, there must be means to relieve and willfulness in withholding relief," Stehr v State, 92 Neb 755; 139 NW 676, 678 (1913). Officials of course have both "means to relieve" and "willfulness in withholding relief" as it is their duty to both obey and enforce laws. See § 2 above. Individual countries can already prosecute, and extradite non-citizens.

    In addition, the International Criminal Court is in process. It is to call attention to this additional court that this paper is written. This additional court, though unknown to laymen, is to have significant jurisdiction. (Nazis in World War II overlooked the then-unknown court that would soon convict, and even execute, perpetrators, whose total killings were less than the numbers tobacco kills.

    Ignorance is no excuse!
  • Ignorantia eorum quæ quis scire tenetur non excusat; ignorance of those things which one is bound to know excuses not.

  • Ignorantia juris quod quisque tenetur scire, neminem excusat; ignorance of the [or a] law, which every one is bound to know, excuses no man.

  • Ignorantia legis neminem excusat; ignorance of law excuses no one.

  • Ignorantia juris non excusat; ignorance of the law excuses not.

  • Reason: Ignorare legis est lata culpa; to be ignorant of the law is gross neglect—five Latin sayings to the same effect, it is such a well established concept.

    • The jurisdiction of the ICC covers crimes committed after the entry into force of the Statute (Article 11). The Statute is non-retroactive, in the narrow sense that no person may be criminally responsible under the Statute for conduct prior to the entry into force of the Statute (Article 24). However, premeditation/intent is already shown; and as Nazis learned at Nuremberg, current laws allowing up to execution already exist and have been used for less (the six million Nazi holocaust, vs 37 million+ re tobacco).

    The Nurnberg Trial, 6 FRD 69 (1946), establishes authorization to prosecute even for governmental lawmaking functions. For example, Hermann Goering was equivalent to "Speaker of the House," i.e., was "president of the Reichstag." In that capacity, he had a role in the adoption of the anti-Jewish Nuremberg Laws. In his own testimony, he admitted to entering the Nuremberg Law on the books. A Germany attorney, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, signed implementing legal documents sending people to extermination camps. Both were found guilty. It is in essence murder to both implement pro-death laws, and to adopt them in the first place.

    The trial of Adolf Eichmann (Israel, 1961) is also instructive. He was found guilty of "causing the killing of millions," placing "millions . . . under conditions which were likely to lead to their physical destruction," "causing serious bodily and mental harm," and "membership in . . . organizations judged 'criminal.'" These same charges surely apply to all tobacco officials involved in such activities with respect to both smokers and nonsmokers being injured and killed by tobacco. The recent (22 Sep 1999) U.S. Department of Justice lawsuit pursuant to U.S. law 18 USC § 1961, § 1962, § 1963, and/or § 1964, etc., stands for the concept that tobacco companies are indeed criminal organizations. Standard legal definitions of course corroborate this concept.

    Media Censorship of Cigarette Effects

    The Criminal Organization Concept
    Applied to Tobacco Companies
    Prior Advice to DOJ
    DoJ Lawsuit
    DoJ Appendix
    DoJ Press Release
    Law Writer Analysis
    Health Group Analysis

    8. No Escaping Liability

    In law, any nation or "state may impose liabilities, even upon persons not within its allegiance, for conduct outside its borders . . . which the state reprehends." United States v Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa), 148 F2d 416, 443 (CA 2, 1945); Continental Ore Co v Union Carbide & Carbon Corp, 370 US 690; 82 S Ct 1404; 8 L Ed 2d 777 (1962); and Zenith Radio Corp v Hotline Research, Inc, 395 US 100; 89 S Ct 1562; 23 L Ed 2d 129 (1969). "The mere fact that a lawsuit involves activities abroad . . . does not imply that American courts are without jurisdiction." Filartiga v Pena-Irala, 630 F2d 876, 889-890 (CA 2, 1980); Assoc Container Transp. (Australia) Ltd v U.S., 705 F2d 53, 61 (CA 2, 1983). Of course, this principle has validity for courts in all nations; they too have jurisdiction of actions, even those in the U.S.

    In view of the range of laws, it is doubtful that opportunity exists for the perpetrators to escape liability under the provisions of the Statute as they have shown no inclination under current law, to cease and desist increasing the mortality from tobacco use. Due to the foreseeable increase in mortality from past smoking, as a consequence of the latency of tobacco-related disease, every effort would need to be made to reduce consumption so as to avoid a significant increase in the current death toll. Certainly expansion in lesser developed countries should not occur. Absent mass reductions, mass prosecutions as at Nuremberg are anticipated.

    Trigger mechanisms for the exercise of the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court include a complaint lodged by a State Party (Articles 13 & 14). Alternatively, the Prosecutor may initiate investigations on the basis of information on crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court (Article 15). Individual victims should complain, and their families, relatives, friends, and acquaintances, everyone with knowledge of tobacco selling by any distributor or store.

    While the scope exists for those working in the field of tobacco control to prepare a brief of relevant material and serve it formally on tobacco operatives and sellers, this is legally unnecessary. All that is needed is complaining to the office of the Prosecutor requesting an investigation. Representations can also be made to State Parties requesting a referral to the Prosecutor. Thereafter, as the WHO projections come to be realized, more and more perpetrators will foreseeably be progressively prosecuted, jailed, fined and made to forfeit assets and pay reparations. (It is doubtful that any will attempt to mitigate guilt by immediately ceasing tobacco operations and sales.)

    It is essential to understand that what is at issue is an "ultrahazardous activity" as that term is defined in professional material. See an analysis of the concept by the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Laird v Nelms, 406 US 797; 92 S Ct 1899; 32 L Ed 2d 499 (1972). There, sonic booms and dynamite blasting are discussed in context of "ultrahazardous activity." Each produces a spreading effect.
    Cigarettes do that via fires and via their toxic chemicals, superheated, moving at high speed. In contrast to sonic booms and dynamite blasting, cigarettes kill 37,000,000 in the U.S. alone, and constitute a "holocaust." This is the most ultrahazardous activity on earth.
    The point, in law, is that in dealing with "ultrahazardous activity," there is "strict liability" for all consequent damages, even if negligence is not proven.

    Of course, pursuant to current laws, State Parties can foreseeably initiate prosecutions leading to executions of tobacco operatives and sellers. As two separate jurisdictions are involved, double jeopardy does not apply. State Parties who might otherwise be deemed accessories as discussed in § 2 above, would foreseeably utilize such prosecutions and executions to mitigate on their own behalf.

    The potential for prosecutions is gradually increasing. For example, recently President Nelson Mandela (South Africa) signed a Tobacco Products Control Amendment Act. For those who want to examine it, information available to TCPG is that it will shortly be published on the South African government's web site: http://www.parliament.gov.za.

    As The Nurnberg Trial, 6 FRD 69 (1946), shows, prosecutions can be just around the corner. And, just as other holocaust perpetrators are still being pursued, current tobacco operatives and sellers can expect likewise. There is no statute of limitations.

    For background on a current (2005) US murder prosecution case re a 1963 murder, see the article by Kathleen Parker, "When a man seeks justice for all" (Orlando Sentinel, 16 Jan 2005), edited and printed as "Reporter's findings revive trials on civil rights killings" (Detroit News, Tuesday, January 18, 2005).

    See also
  • Martha Minow, Between Vengeance and Forgiveness: Facing History after Genocide and Mass Violence (Boston: Beacon Press, 1998)

  • Nancy Amoury Combs, Guilty Pleas in International Criminal Law: Constructing a Restorative Justice Approach (Stanford: Stanford Univ Press, 2007) (Review).

    • 9. Michigan Precedents

    See also § 2 above. For law dictionary definitions of pertinent legal terms, click here. For information on extraditing perpetrators, click here.

    See also Edward M. Kalinka, "The Changing RICO Pattern Required by Michigan Judges," 68 Michigan Bar Journal (#10) 960-964 (October 1989) citing Michigan precedents pursuant to a pertinent U.S. Supreme Court decision, Sedima, S. P. R. L. v Imrex Co., 473 US 479; 105 S Ct 3275; 87 L Ed 2d 346 (1985).

    Michigan (U.S.A.) Governor John Engler [1991-2002] and his staff have been supportive and are trying to halt cigarette smuggling, issuing five memoranda on the subject.

    Exec Order 1992-3
    Law Support Letter # 1
    		Anti-Cigarette Smuggling Finding Law Support Letter # 2 Governor's Overview

    To see Michigan's cigarette control law, click here. For The Crime Prevention Group's analysis of that law, click here.

    For an example of how these principles were applied in a recent court case, to bring to government officials' attention, one of the multiple legal ramifications of their misconduct in failure to enforce pertinent laws, click here. In The Nurnberg Trial, 6 FRD 69, 161-163 (1946), prosecution included Julius Streicher, a Nazi propagandist who was convicted and hanged for his pro-death media words. So prosecutions for tobacco deaths must also include aiders and abettors in the media.

    When writings, books, newspaper ads, commercials, etc., aid and abet the killings, the publishers and advertisers are liable, as nothing in freedom of the press allows aiding and abetting murder and genocide, pursuant to case law such as Paladin Enterprises, Inc v Rice, 128 F3d 233 (CA 4, 1997) cert den 523 US 1074; 118 S Ct 1515; 140 L Ed 2d 668 (1998).

    10. References

    WHO estimates are taken from TOBACCO ALERT April 1996 "The Tobacco Epidemic: A Global Public Health Emergency" accessible at the WHO website .

    Other material including data on transnational tobacco companies is taken from TOBACCO ALERT April 1996 and INFACT's 1998 People's Annual Report "GLOBAL AGGRESSION - The Case for World Standards and Bold US Action Challenging Philip Morris and RJR Nabisco."

    This website author's letter "Suggestion for Preventing Deaths in China" (by using U.S. and Michigan-style laws for prosecution purposes) is posted at the British Medical Journal http://www.bmj.com website in the context of studies on China's anticipated cigarette-caused holocaust.

    People Against Smoking provides information on the high number of annual deaths caused by smoking, in the millions. This confirms what the Royal College of Physicians of London said in 1971.

    The Nurnberg Trial, 6 FRD 69 (1946), and other court cases are typically available at most if not all law libraries, and some of the larger public libraries. Streicher was not the only media person hanged for his criminal words. So was William Joyce, details in the book edited by J. W. Hall, M.A., B.C.L. (Oxon), Trial of William Joyce (London: William Hodge and Co, Ltd, Notable British Trials Series, 1946).

    the Rwandan cases in 1999-2003.

    For further reading
    • on corporate manslaughter, see Stephanie Trotter, President, CO Gas Safety, "Corporate Manslaughter," 150 New Law Journal (#6929) 454-455 (Reed Elsevier (UK) Ltd, 31 March 2000) (fines need to be large enough to be meaningful)

    • Chodos v Insurance Company of North America, 126 Cal App 3d 86; 178 Cal. Rep. 831 (1981) (rejecting company complaint on appeal that it's welath has been emphasized at trial. The appeals court ruled that punitive damages are intended to deter, so the richer the offender, the higher the damages award would have to be.
    • on the general principles of court jurisdiction across international borders, see Edvard Hambro, "Human Rights and States' Rights," 56 American Bar Ass'n Journal (#4) 360-363 (April 1970), and any standard international law reference book, e.g., Gary B. Born and David Westin, International Civil Litigation in United States Courts (Deventer, Netherlands and Boston, Mass, USA: Kluwer Law and Taxation Publishers, 1988).

    • Alex Alvarez, Governments, Citizens, and Genocide: A Comparative and Interdisciplinary Approach (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001).

    • "Mexico Awaits Hague Ruling on Citizens on U.S. Death Row," by Adam Liptak, New York Times (16 January 2004), saying, The U.S. "has . . . been a party to the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations since 1969, as well as to a separate protocol in which it submitted to the jurisdiction of the international court to interpret the convention and to resolve disputes about it. Treaties are, under the Constitution, 'the supreme law of the land.' Although the United States does not view the rulings of many international bodies as binding, it does acknowledge the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice to decide cases brought under the consular relations convention and, in some circumstances, to order nations to comply with the court's interpretation of it."

    • Abid Aslam, "U.S., Others Take Heat for Opposing U.N. Genocide Agreement " (14 August 2005).

    • See also Samantha Power, A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide (New York: Basic Books, 2002) (Review).

    • Jenna Greene, "ICC Adds Aggression to List of Crimes Despite US Opposition" (Legal Times, 15 June 2010) (Aggression is a “crime committed by a political or military leader which, by its character, gravity and scale constituted a manifest violation of the Charter.” "The ICC is intended as a court of last resort to punish crimes that shock the conscience – genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and now aggression – when there is no ability to do so at the national level.")

    The concept of having an international system for dealing with international problems has been progressively developing since ancient times.

    Fundamental Principles
    "The proof of the pattern or practice [of willingness to commit acts such as the above] supports an inference that any particular decision, during the period in which the policy was in force, was made in pursuit of that policy." Teamsters v U.S., 431 US 324, 362; 97 S Ct 1843, 1868; 52 L Ed 2d 396, 431 (1977).

    Violations of criminal law can indeed result in damage to private citizens. Ware-Kramer Tobacco Co v American Tobacco Co, 180 F 160 (ED NC, 1910).

    Litigants can show as part of the evidence in his/her own case, the guilt of others linked to the current defendant, in showing a pattern. Locker v American Tobacco Co, 194 F 232 (1912).

    Recommended Websites for Background Data
    Crime Prevention Government Confession Government Crime
    Medical Statistics Michigan Law Prosecuting Non-Enforcers
    Tobacco Murder Toxic Chemicals U.S. Supreme Court Tobacco Cases
    Federal Circuit Court Tobacco Cases Dangerous Tobacco Cases Tobacco Company Behavior Cases

    See also the Journal of Genocide Research.

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