PHILIP MORRIS USA, INC. vs STEFFANY SOMMERS, etc.,

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Third District Court of Appeal State of Florida Opinion filed November 27, 2019. Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing. ________________ Nos. 3D18-908 & 3D18-228 Lower Tribunal No. 08-1464 ________________ Philip Morris USA, Inc., Appellant/Cross-Appellee, vs. Stefanny Sommers, etc., Appellee/Cross-Appellant. Appeals from the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Monica Gordo and Rodolfo A. Ruiz, Judges. Shook, Hardy & Bacon, L.L.P., and J. Daniel Gardner; Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer, LLP, David M. Menichetti and Geoffrey J. Michael (Washington, DC), for appellant/cross-appellee. Eaton & Wolk, PL and Douglas F. Eaton, for appellee/cross-appellant. Before EMAS, C.J., and FERNANDEZ, and MILLER, JJ. FERNANDEZ, J. On Partial Concession of Error Philip Morris USA, Inc. appeals: 1.) the trial court’s order granting a new trial as to punitive damages for Sommers’s non-intentional tort claims, entering final judgment in favor of Sommers, and awarding compensatory damages; and 2.) the trial court’s denial of Philip Morris’s motion for mistrial.1 Stefanny Sommers, as personal representative of the estate of Bert Sommers, filed a cross-appeal on the trial court’s order partially granting Sommers’s motion for new trial as to punitive damages on her non-intentional tort claims only and, by default, denying her request for punitive damages as to her intentional tort claims. On Philip Morris’s proper concession of error as to the cross-appeal, we partially reverse the order on cross-appeal as to Sommers’s intentional tort claims and remand for a new trial on punitive damages for both her intentional and non-intentional tort claims. We affirm as to all other issues without further discussion. Affirmed in part; reversed in part and remanded for new trial. 1 The Court consolidated the separate appeals for all purposes. 2

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