Smoker's widow gets $6.3M in damages

The six jurors returned the award Wednesday for Elaine Hess for the 1997 death of her husband Stuart Hess. He had been a chain smoker for decades.

The award amounts to $1.3 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages against Richmond, Va.-based Philip Morris USA, a unit of Altria Group. Hess's attorneys sought $130 million.

The case was the first to go to trial since the Florida Supreme Court in 2006 voided a $145 billion class-action award for smoking victims. The court said each case had to be decided individually.