2018 Altria Group Annual Shareholders Meeting – A Time of Transitions
By Edward L. Sweda, Jr., Senior Attorney It became clear in the months leading up to the May 17th Annual Shareholders Meeting for Altria Group that 2018 would be a time for change for the company. In January, Chairman, CEO and President Martin Barrington publicly announced his intention to retire due to the approach of […]
Snowflakes Are Found in 84 Degree Richmond: The 2017 Altria Group Annual Shareholders Meeting
By Edward L. Sweda, Jr., PHAI Senior Attorney As I approached the Greater Richmond Convention Center on the partly cloudy morning of Thursday, May 18, 2017, thoughts of sub-freezing temperatures and snowstorms never entered my mind. But, before the morning gave way to the afternoon, I realized that I had just seen dozens of snowflakes. As […]
Spending 45 Minutes with 80 of My Fellow Altria Shareholders
by Edward L. Sweda, Jr. As soon as Altria Group, Inc. Chairman, CEO and President Martin J. Barrington opened the 2016 Annual Shareholders Meeting, he boasted that 2015 had been “another terrific year.” The “excellent business results” included dividends increasing by 8.7% (to $4.2 billion) and a shareholder return of more than 23%. Marlboro, with […]
PHAI’s Daynard Discusses Tony Gwynn Lawsuit on ESPN and in the New York Times
On May 23, 2016, the widow and children of baseball great Tony Gwynn filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Altria Group alleging that the manufacturers of Skoal smokeless tobacco’s negligence, fraud, defective design, and failure-to-warn caused the death of the Hall of Famer in 2014. Richard Daynard, PHAI’s president and University Distinguished Professor of Law at […]
Under An Hour: My Time at the 2015 Altria Group, Inc. Annual Shareholders Meeting
By Edward L. Sweda, Jr. There are 8,760 hours in any given year (excluding leap years). The management of Altria Group, Inc. used just under one of those 8,760 hours to conduct its 2015 Annual Shareholders’ Meeting at the Greater Richmond Convention Center in Richmond, Virginia on the morning of May 20th. The meeting began precisely […]
PHAI Takes Cigarette Companies to Court
For Immediate Release Contact: Mark Gottlieb – 617-373-2026 The Public Health Advocacy Institute (“PHAI”) announced today that its newly formed Center for Public Health Litigation has filed lawsuits against two major tobacco companies and several local distributors on behalf of the families of two former smokers who suffered devastating disease from smoking […]
An hour with Altria Group, Inc.
By Edward Sweda Opening the company’s 2014 Annual Shareholders Meeting at precisely 9:00 A.M., Martin J. Barrington, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Altria Group, Inc., had plenty of good news to report to shareholders who had assembled at the Greater Richmond Convention Center on the morning of Wednesday, May 14. During his report on […]
2013 Altria Group, Inc. Annual Shareholders Meeting: Politely conducting business as usual
By Edward L. Sweda, J.D. In sharp contrast to the manner in which management at Reynolds American, Inc. conducted its annual meeting of shareholders a week earlier, Altria Group, Inc.’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Martin J. Barrington treated everyone at the May 16th meeting in Richmond, Virginia with courtesy and politeness. Barrington began his presentation […]
Big Victory at Florida Supreme Court is Bad News for Cigarette Manufacturers
Florida smokers and their families who are suing tobacco companies won a resounding victory on March 14, 2013 when the Supreme Court of Florida upheld its landmark 2006 ruling in Engle v. Liggett Group, Inc., 945 So.2d 1246 (Fla. 2006). By a vote of 6 to 1, Florida’s highest court ruled in favor of the […]
PHAI’s Friedman and Gottlieb Co-author: “Soda and Tobacco Industry Corporate Social Responsibility Campaigns: How Do They Compare?” in PLoS Medicine
PHAI senior staff attorney Lissy Friedman and executive director Mark Gottlieb collaborated with Lori Dorfman, Andrew Cheyne and Asiya Wadud of the Berkeley Media Studies Group to produce this article published today in PLoS Medicine. Soda companies’ PR campaigns are bad for health: Health advocates need to organize strong public health campaigns to educate the […]
