## Facts

- Winona M. Hearn began smoking cigarettes around 1950 at age sixteen and allegedly became addicted.
- Plaintiffs alleged defendants’ advertising induced her to start smoking and that defendants minimized or concealed smoking’s health risks and addictiveness.
- Plaintiffs alleged that by the time federally mandated warnings appeared after the 1969 federal labeling amendments, Hearn’s addiction made cessation effectively impossible.
- Hearn was diagnosed with lung cancer in April 2000 and died in November 2000.
- Roger Hearn (individually and as estate representative) and Lori Ann Peterson sued cigarette manufacturers in Arizona state court; the case was removed to federal court.
- Plaintiffs asserted claims including strict products liability (design defect and failure to warn), negligence, breach of warranty, fraud/misrepresentation, conspiracy, and statutory theories.
- Defendants moved to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), arguing express federal preemption under the Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act (FCLAA), limitations defenses, and “common knowledge” and related bars.

## Issues

1. To what extent does the FCLAA expressly preempt state-law claims that would impose duties concerning cigarette advertising, promotion, or warnings after the 1969 amendments?
2. Whether pleaded design-defect and negligence theories stated plausible non-preempted claims independent of advertising- or warning-content duties.
3. Whether fraud, misrepresentation, and concealment theories were preempted, inadequately pleaded, or otherwise barred at the Rule 12 stage.
4. Whether statutes of limitations, assumption-of-risk-type arguments, or “common knowledge” defenses warranted dismissal on the pleadings.

## Decision

- The court granted the motion to dismiss in part and denied it in part.
- The court dismissed, as FCLAA-preempted, claims and theories that would impose post-1969 state-law requirements for additional or different warnings in advertising or promotion beyond federal warnings.
- The court allowed design-defect and non-warning-based negligence theories to proceed to the extent they alleged cigarettes were engineered to be unnecessarily dangerous and addictive apart from warning adequacy.
- The court allowed certain fraud/concealment/misrepresentation theories to proceed insofar as they alleged affirmative deception or non-warning-related deceit rather than a demand for additional warning content.
- The court declined to dismiss claims as time-barred or barred by “common knowledge” at the pleading stage, treating accrual and consumer knowledge as fact-dependent.

## Legal Principles

- Under the FCLAA, state-law “requirements or prohibitions” based on smoking and health that target cigarette advertising or promotion after the 1969 amendments are expressly preempted when they function as additional or different warning obligations.
- Preemption requires claim-by-claim analysis; not all state tort theories involving cigarettes are categorically barred.
- Design-defect and negligence claims may fall outside FCLAA preemption when they rest on product design or conduct allegations independent of mandated warning content.
- Fraud-based claims are preempted to the extent they effectively impose advertising or warning-content duties, but claims grounded in a general duty not to deceive may survive if not framed as additional warning requirements.
- Limitations and “common knowledge” defenses may be unsuitable for Rule 12(b)(6) resolution when the complaint plausibly alleges disputed facts about knowledge, reliance, addiction, and accrual.

## Conclusion

The court enforced FCLAA preemption against post-1969 warning- and advertising-content theories, but permitted non-warning design and negligence claims and certain deception-based theories to proceed, while reserving limitations and “common knowledge” defenses for later factual development.


Hearn v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., 279 F. Supp. 2d 1096 (D. Ariz. 2003)