The US Supreme Court has declined to hear Philip Morris USA's challenge to a $US25 million ($A34.5 million) Oregon jury verdict in favour of a man whose wife died of a lung cancer-related brain tumour after smoking the company's low-tar cigarettes.
By rejecting the cigarette maker's appeal on Monday, the high court left in place a July 2015 Oregon Court of Appeals ruling in favour of Paul Schwarz, the husband of Michelle Schwarz, a long-term smoker who died in 1999. Philip Morris is owned by Altria Group Inc.
Michelle Schwarz began smoking in 1964 at age 18 and tried but failed to quit numerous times before switching in 1976 to the company's Merit brand that was advertised as "full flavour" but "low-tar" cigarettes, according to court papers.
She died in 1999 at age 53 from a brain tumour that was the result of metastatic lung cancer, according to court papers.
The suit accused the company of negligence and fraud.
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