New York state is not entitled to its own separate arbitration to determine whether it must contribute to a $1.1 billion adjustment that the tobacco industry has won for payments it must make under the 1998 nationwide tobacco settlement, a unanimous appeals court has ruled.
In an unsigned ruling, the Appellate Division, 1st Department, last week reversed a January decision by Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Charles E. Ramos granting the state attorney general’s request for a separate arbitration and ordering the tobacco industry to select an arbitrator for the single-state arbitration.
