The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee approved legislation that would crack down on Internet sales of tobacco products, which many public-health advocates believe is a common way that minors get cigarettes. The legislation, supported by Henrico County-based tobacco giant Altria Group Inc., would make it illegal to mail cigarettes to buyers.

A South Florida jury yesterday ordered Philip Morris USA to pay $300 million to a former smoker, agreeing that the tobacco company’s negligence was the cause of her emphysema. The award in Broward County for Cindy Naugle, 61, is the largest to date among thousands of lawsuits filed in Florida against tobacco companies. “Cindy admitted her fault to the jury,“ her attorney, Robert W. Kelley, said. “But Philip Morris refused to accept any responsibility for her emphysema, even though she was an addicted customer for 25 years.“

As part of a campaign against counterfeit cigarettes, Philip Morris USA is suing 10 retailers in New York and New Jersey alleging they’ve been selling fake Marlboros. The Henrico County-based cigarette-maker has monitored retail markets for years to keep fake versions of its brands off store shelves. This year, Philip Morris has sued 27 stores in New York and New Jersey, which are hotspots for the fakes because of high state taxes, a huge port through which the contraband is easily shipped, and criminal organizations that wholesale the counterfeits.

A new, multimillion-dollar tax loophole is leading some firms to start labeling their tobacco for roll-your-own cigarettes as pipe tobacco. New tobacco taxes, meant to finance an expansion of children’s health insurance, boosted the levy on tobacco for roll-your-own cigarettes from $1.10 a pound to $24.78 a pound. But the tiny, fading market of pipe smokers managed to get by with a federal tax of $2.83 a pound.

A federal judge has turned down a request by the nation’s No. 2 cigarette-maker and others to immediately halt enforcement of new federal regulations on tobacco products. Their challenge to new U.S. Food and Drug Administration powers to regulate what tobacco firms say about their products has little likelihood of success, except on one point, Judge Joseph H. McKinley Jr. of the U.S. District Court in Bowling Green, Ky., ruled yesterday.

The nation’s two top cigarette-makers are boosting per-pack prices by 6 cents to 8 cents. Though the companies won’t say why, analysts believe it is to cover new user fees charged by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to pay for the costs of its new assignment to regulate tobacco. The increase on what manufacturers charge wholesalers seems unlikely to have a big effect on smoking, as this spring’s 61.66-cent-a-pack increase in federal excise taxes did.

No. 1 cigarette-maker Altria Group Inc. shook off the effect of a nearly 62-cents-a-pack federal tax increase in April to report higher third-quarter profits yesterday. Continuing cuts in the cost of making its cigarettes, cigars and smokeless tobacco for the quarter helped the Henrico County-based company deal with its quarterly federal excise tax bill more than doubling.

Cigarette maker Philip Morris USA might have to pay for chest scans so longtime smokers can get early warnings of lung cancer, the highest court in Massachusetts ruled yesterday. The Supreme Judicial Court ruled unanimously that under some circumstances, Massachusetts law recognizes a claim by individual smokers for medical monitoring even without the presence of an actual injury.

About half of the millions of dollars in fees that will pay for the Food and Drug Administration’s regulation of tobacco products will come from Henrico County-based Altria Group Inc. The FDA this week started collecting fees from the nation’s tobacco companies to fund the agency’s newly created Center for Tobacco Products. The user fees, which will be collected quarterly, are based on each company’s share of the U.S. tobacco market.

David Ferrell, 20, says he sees a good future in farming, even for tobacco, a crop that has sustained his family’s farm in Charlotte County for several generations.

The federal ban on flavored cigarettes took effect yesterday, marking one of the first visible signs of the Food and Drug Administration’s new authority to regulate tobacco. The ban on manufacturing, importing, marketing and distribution includes candy-, fruitand clove-flavored cigarettes, which health and federal authorities say are more appealing to youth. It does not include a ban on menthol or other flavored tobacco products such as cigars—issues that the FDA is studying.

Sharing a ride with a smoker will give you a much heftier dose of nicotine than having a meal in a restaurant that allows smoking or hanging out at a smoky bar, according to new research.

Philip Morris USA plans to make a bigger push into the still-uncertain market for snus, a Swedish-style oral tobacco, expanding an experiment it is now running in three cities. The nation’s No. 1 cigarette-maker will market snus, using its flagship Marlboro brand name, more broadly this fall, said Michael E. Szymanczyk, chairman and chief executive of Philip Morris’ parent, Henrico County-based Altria Group.

Every six weeks or so, the guy from Philip Morris, as his customers still think of him, swings by for a chat. But this summer, salespeople like Winfred Hayes are changing hats. He now works for Philip Morris USA’s parent, Altria Group.

A California jury decided yesterday that cigarette maker Philip Morris USA should pay $13.8 million in punitive damages to the daughter of a longtime smoker who died of lung cancer. The Los Angeles County Superior Court jury voted 9-3 in favor of Jodie Bullock, who is now the plaintiff in the case filed by her mother eight years ago. Betty Bullock of Newport Beach, who smoked Philip Morris-made Marlboro and Benson & Hedges cigarettes for 45 years, died of lung cancer in February 2003.