1993
March
Jeffery Wigand, head of research for Brown & Williamson Tobacco, is fired after being with the company for four years. Wigand claims Brown & Williamson were trying to kill his research. At the time of his termination, Wigand signs a confidentiality agreement in order to receive his severance benefits.
September
Brown & Williamson sues Wigand, suspend his health insurance and severance benefits, and contends that he violated his confidentiality pledge by discussing the terms of his severance with another company executive.
November
Wigand signs another “nondisclosure settlement agreement” that is tougher than the original confidentiality pledge with B&W and Wigand’s benefits are reinstated. (At the time Brown & Williamson were aware that Wigand had been called to testify in the 1993 U.S. Justice Departmant’s investigation of Philip Morris’ “fire safe” cigarette program.)
1994
February
Lowell Bergman meets Jeffrey Wigand while producing a 60 Minutes story on Philip Morris’ “fire safe” cigarette. Bergman asks Wigand to help him interpret secret documents from Philip Morris that had been sent to him anonymously in late 1993.
ABC’s newsmagazine, Day One, broadcasts a story contending that Philip Morris “spikes” the nicotine content of its cigarettes.
March
60 Minutes airs its story on Philip Morris’ “fire safe” cigarette program; the research, the story contended, was killed by Philip Morris for fear of negative legal ramifications. During the course of the story’s production, Wigand was reportedly paid an estimated $12,000 for his time and expenses as a consultant for 60 Minutes.
April
The seven big tobacco companies testify at the Waxman trials in front of congress.
May
Stanton Glantz, professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, unexpectedly receives an anonymous donation of 4,000 pages of Brown & Williamson documents.
July
The Justice Department opens a criminal investigation into possible perjury by the seven top tobacco company executives, who testified at the congressional hearings in April that “nicotine is not addictive.”
October
During a dispute, Lucretia, Wigand’s wife, claimed Jeffrey had “smashed” her nose, while Jeffrey claimed she had hit him with a hanger and locked herself upstairs. Both agreed the pressure and stress of Brown & Williamson was getting to them and was creating a rift in their marriage.
1995
March
Bergman files a “blue sheet” with 60 Minutes proposing an investigative story on B&W. The story is quickly approved by CBS and Bergman and team members begin to report with Wigand in Louisville.
June
Wigand’s lawyer negotiates with CBS lawyers on the question of indemnification (to protect against damage, loss, or injury; insure) for legal fees and costs of libel suits that might arise in connection with his appearance on 60 Minutes.
July
Stanton Glantz posts the voluminous, internal Brown & Williamson documents on the Internet.
60 Minutes learns that Wigand will be a witness in the Justice Department’s criminal investigation on the tobacco companies CEO's and possible perjury during their 1994 hearings. Andrew Tisch, the CEO of Lorillard tobacco and the son of CBS Chairman Laurence Tisch, is under investigation. 60 Minutes also discovers that Wigand was listed as an expert defense witness for ABC, in its Philip Morris/R.J. Reynolds suit.
August
Laurence Tisch announces at a press conference that the Westinghouse Electric Corporation will pay $5.4 billion to acquire CBS Inc. The announcement comes one day after the Walt Disney Company agrees to pay $19 billion for Capital Cities/ABC Inc., a merger that creates the largest entertainment company in the world.
Jeffery Wigand and his wife agree to be interviewed by 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace, after a summer of indecision about whether to appear on camera. Producer Bergman gives Wigand a handwritten note assuring him that CBS will not air the interview without his consent. Bergman believed that this was a courtesy, not a “veto power” over the story to Wigand.
ABC News agrees to apologize for its February 28, 1994 Day One report that said Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds controlled and manipulated nicotine levels to addict smokers. The carefully worded apology—delivered first on-air at half-time of Monday Night Football—said, in part,
60 Minutes producer Bergman is called into CBS corporate offices to meet with CBS lawyers regarding the Wigand story. Bergman meets at length with CBS lawyers, reviewing the facts and methods of his investigation and turning over all notes and memos regarding Wigand. The lawyers report to Bergman the concerns of CBS general counsel, Ellen Kaden, regarding the possibility of a Brown & Williamson suit for “tortious interference.” Tortious interference is when harm is caused by intentionally 1) disrupting a contractual relationship, for example by preventing one party from delivering goods on time, or 2) harming a business relationship or activity, for example, by spreading lies about a competitor to one of its clients. The lawyers also pass along Kaden’s order to halt reporting on the story. In Bergman’s twelve years at 60 Minutes, he had never had to go to corporate offices, and that it was the first time in his entire reporting career that he heard of the concept of tortious interference.
An intense, lengthy meeting is held with Eric Ober, CBS News President, to discuss the Wigand interview. Besides Ober, those in attendance are Ellen Kaden, CBS vice president and general counsel; Phil Scheffler, 60 Minutes senior producer; Don Hewitt 60 Minutes executive producer; correspondent Mike Wallace; and producer Lowell Bergman. Presenting the facts of the case, Bergman makes clear that Wigand had been subpoenaed in the Justice Department perjury probe, which was said to be focusing on Andrew Tisch and James W. Johnston, the chairman of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco. They also discussed the ABC/Philip Morris settlement and Wigand’s involvement in other legal proceedings. Possible ways to air the story while minimizing risk to CBS were debated. The meeting concluded with Kaden saying that she would send the matter to outside counsel for second opinion. Kaden feared a suit by B&W against CBS for tortious interference with Wigand’s confidentiality/non-disclosure agreement in 1993.
October
General counsel Kaden issues a final decision not to run the Wigand interview. Kaden reports that outside counsel, P. Cameron Devore, generally concurred with her on the serious possibility of a tortious interference action against CBS Inc. by Brown & Williamson.
The Wall Street Journal, guided by Jeffrey Wigand, discusses two major internal reports by Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corporation showing that leading U.S. tobacco companies enhance nicotine delivery to smokers by adding ammonia-based compounds to cigarettes. The documents indicate that while cigarette makers may not boost nicotine content itself, most add chemicals that increase the potency of the nicotine inhaled. An accompanying article looks at other additives in Philip Morris' Marlboro cigarette. Wigand is not named in the story. The substance of the report was largely similar to the embargoed 60 Minutes piece built around Wigand's August 3rd interview. In 1996, the Wall Street Journal won a Pulitzer Prize for this story.
CBS files a proxy statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission, detailing the money to be gained by CBS executive officers and others on completion of the Westinghouse buyout. Under the heading "Interests of Certain Persons in the Merger," it is reported that, among others, Peter Lund, CBS Broadcast Group president, will get roughly $ 2.2 million; Eric Ober, CBS News president, will get $1.46 million; Ellen Kaden, executive vice president and general counsel, will get $1.2 million, and Laurence Tisch, CBS chairman, will get some $12 million.
November
The New York Times is first to report that CBS lawyers ordered 60 Minutes not to air the Wigand interview. "I'm very comfortable with the decision," Hewitt is quoted as saying. The story concludes, "Both Mr. Wallace and Mr. Hewitt said they had no objection to the decision made by Ms. Kaden or Mr. Ober."
60 Minutes airs a redacted version of the Brown & Williamson tobacco story; Wigand is not identified as the source. At the end of the broadcast, Mike Wallace offered a "footnote":
CBS Inc. shareholders vote by a 2-to-1 margin to sell the broadcasting company to the Westinghouse Electric Corporation for $5.4 billion.
The New York Daily News, having obtained a copy of the redacted November 12th "60 Minutes" script, is the first to name Wigand as the story's source.
With the request of anti-tobacco plaintiffs' lawyers, Jeffrey Wigand provides a deposition in a civil action against tobacco manufacturers brought by the state of Mississippi. The state sought reimbursement for the cost of treating smoking-related illnesses over the years.
1996
January
The Wall Street Journal obtains Wigand's November 1995 Mississippi deposition and publishes it in full on their web site. In the transcript, Wigand supports previously publicized contentions that Brown & Williamson lawyers improperly controlled research programs, in an effort to limit potential liability in injury lawsuits filed against the company.
Lucretia Wigand files for divorce.
February
The Wigand interview airs on 60 Minutes. In the introduction to the story, Mike Wallace explains:
At this point, the critical substance of Wigand's testimony has already been reported by other sources.
Jeffery Wigand, head of research for Brown & Williamson Tobacco, is fired after being with the company for four years. Wigand claims Brown & Williamson were trying to kill his research. At the time of his termination, Wigand signs a confidentiality agreement in order to receive his severance benefits.
September
Brown & Williamson sues Wigand, suspend his health insurance and severance benefits, and contends that he violated his confidentiality pledge by discussing the terms of his severance with another company executive.
November
Wigand signs another “nondisclosure settlement agreement” that is tougher than the original confidentiality pledge with B&W and Wigand’s benefits are reinstated. (At the time Brown & Williamson were aware that Wigand had been called to testify in the 1993 U.S. Justice Departmant’s investigation of Philip Morris’ “fire safe” cigarette program.)
1994
February
Lowell Bergman meets Jeffrey Wigand while producing a 60 Minutes story on Philip Morris’ “fire safe” cigarette. Bergman asks Wigand to help him interpret secret documents from Philip Morris that had been sent to him anonymously in late 1993.
ABC’s newsmagazine, Day One, broadcasts a story contending that Philip Morris “spikes” the nicotine content of its cigarettes.
March
60 Minutes airs its story on Philip Morris’ “fire safe” cigarette program; the research, the story contended, was killed by Philip Morris for fear of negative legal ramifications. During the course of the story’s production, Wigand was reportedly paid an estimated $12,000 for his time and expenses as a consultant for 60 Minutes.
April
The seven big tobacco companies testify at the Waxman trials in front of congress.
May
Stanton Glantz, professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, unexpectedly receives an anonymous donation of 4,000 pages of Brown & Williamson documents.
July
The Justice Department opens a criminal investigation into possible perjury by the seven top tobacco company executives, who testified at the congressional hearings in April that “nicotine is not addictive.”
October
During a dispute, Lucretia, Wigand’s wife, claimed Jeffrey had “smashed” her nose, while Jeffrey claimed she had hit him with a hanger and locked herself upstairs. Both agreed the pressure and stress of Brown & Williamson was getting to them and was creating a rift in their marriage.
1995
March
Bergman files a “blue sheet” with 60 Minutes proposing an investigative story on B&W. The story is quickly approved by CBS and Bergman and team members begin to report with Wigand in Louisville.
June
Wigand’s lawyer negotiates with CBS lawyers on the question of indemnification (to protect against damage, loss, or injury; insure) for legal fees and costs of libel suits that might arise in connection with his appearance on 60 Minutes.
July
Stanton Glantz posts the voluminous, internal Brown & Williamson documents on the Internet.
60 Minutes learns that Wigand will be a witness in the Justice Department’s criminal investigation on the tobacco companies CEO's and possible perjury during their 1994 hearings. Andrew Tisch, the CEO of Lorillard tobacco and the son of CBS Chairman Laurence Tisch, is under investigation. 60 Minutes also discovers that Wigand was listed as an expert defense witness for ABC, in its Philip Morris/R.J. Reynolds suit.
August
Laurence Tisch announces at a press conference that the Westinghouse Electric Corporation will pay $5.4 billion to acquire CBS Inc. The announcement comes one day after the Walt Disney Company agrees to pay $19 billion for Capital Cities/ABC Inc., a merger that creates the largest entertainment company in the world.
Jeffery Wigand and his wife agree to be interviewed by 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace, after a summer of indecision about whether to appear on camera. Producer Bergman gives Wigand a handwritten note assuring him that CBS will not air the interview without his consent. Bergman believed that this was a courtesy, not a “veto power” over the story to Wigand.
ABC News agrees to apologize for its February 28, 1994 Day One report that said Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds controlled and manipulated nicotine levels to addict smokers. The carefully worded apology—delivered first on-air at half-time of Monday Night Football—said, in part,
“We now agree that we should not have reported that Philip Morris and Reynolds add significant amounts of nicotine from outside source.” It added, “We apologize to our audience, Philip Morris and Reynolds.”September
60 Minutes producer Bergman is called into CBS corporate offices to meet with CBS lawyers regarding the Wigand story. Bergman meets at length with CBS lawyers, reviewing the facts and methods of his investigation and turning over all notes and memos regarding Wigand. The lawyers report to Bergman the concerns of CBS general counsel, Ellen Kaden, regarding the possibility of a Brown & Williamson suit for “tortious interference.” Tortious interference is when harm is caused by intentionally 1) disrupting a contractual relationship, for example by preventing one party from delivering goods on time, or 2) harming a business relationship or activity, for example, by spreading lies about a competitor to one of its clients. The lawyers also pass along Kaden’s order to halt reporting on the story. In Bergman’s twelve years at 60 Minutes, he had never had to go to corporate offices, and that it was the first time in his entire reporting career that he heard of the concept of tortious interference.
An intense, lengthy meeting is held with Eric Ober, CBS News President, to discuss the Wigand interview. Besides Ober, those in attendance are Ellen Kaden, CBS vice president and general counsel; Phil Scheffler, 60 Minutes senior producer; Don Hewitt 60 Minutes executive producer; correspondent Mike Wallace; and producer Lowell Bergman. Presenting the facts of the case, Bergman makes clear that Wigand had been subpoenaed in the Justice Department perjury probe, which was said to be focusing on Andrew Tisch and James W. Johnston, the chairman of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco. They also discussed the ABC/Philip Morris settlement and Wigand’s involvement in other legal proceedings. Possible ways to air the story while minimizing risk to CBS were debated. The meeting concluded with Kaden saying that she would send the matter to outside counsel for second opinion. Kaden feared a suit by B&W against CBS for tortious interference with Wigand’s confidentiality/non-disclosure agreement in 1993.
October
General counsel Kaden issues a final decision not to run the Wigand interview. Kaden reports that outside counsel, P. Cameron Devore, generally concurred with her on the serious possibility of a tortious interference action against CBS Inc. by Brown & Williamson.
The Wall Street Journal, guided by Jeffrey Wigand, discusses two major internal reports by Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corporation showing that leading U.S. tobacco companies enhance nicotine delivery to smokers by adding ammonia-based compounds to cigarettes. The documents indicate that while cigarette makers may not boost nicotine content itself, most add chemicals that increase the potency of the nicotine inhaled. An accompanying article looks at other additives in Philip Morris' Marlboro cigarette. Wigand is not named in the story. The substance of the report was largely similar to the embargoed 60 Minutes piece built around Wigand's August 3rd interview. In 1996, the Wall Street Journal won a Pulitzer Prize for this story.
CBS files a proxy statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission, detailing the money to be gained by CBS executive officers and others on completion of the Westinghouse buyout. Under the heading "Interests of Certain Persons in the Merger," it is reported that, among others, Peter Lund, CBS Broadcast Group president, will get roughly $ 2.2 million; Eric Ober, CBS News president, will get $1.46 million; Ellen Kaden, executive vice president and general counsel, will get $1.2 million, and Laurence Tisch, CBS chairman, will get some $12 million.
November
The New York Times is first to report that CBS lawyers ordered 60 Minutes not to air the Wigand interview. "I'm very comfortable with the decision," Hewitt is quoted as saying. The story concludes, "Both Mr. Wallace and Mr. Hewitt said they had no objection to the decision made by Ms. Kaden or Mr. Ober."
60 Minutes airs a redacted version of the Brown & Williamson tobacco story; Wigand is not identified as the source. At the end of the broadcast, Mike Wallace offered a "footnote":
"We at 60 Minutes - and that's about 100 of us who turn out this broadcast each week - are proud of working here and at CBS News, and so we were dismayed that the management at CBS had seen fit to give in to perceived threats of legal action against us by a tobacco industry giant. We've broadcast many such investigative pieces down the years, and we want to be able to continue. We lost out, only to some degree on this one, but we haven't the slightest doubt that we'll be able to continue the 60 Minutes tradition of reporting such pieces in the future without fear or favor."The New York Times publishes an editorial entitled "Self-Censorship at CBS" in which they write:
"The most troubling part of CBS's decision is that it was made not by news executives but by corporate officers who may have their minds on money rather than public service these days. With a $5.4 billion merger deal with the Westinghouse Electric Corporation about to be approved, a multibillion-dollar lawsuit would hardly have been a welcome development."Mike Wallace appears on a PBS interview with Charlie Rose and says, among other things, "We were simply dead wrong. . . we were caving in." [Christopher Plummer, as Wallace, uses nearly this exact same line in the film.]
CBS Inc. shareholders vote by a 2-to-1 margin to sell the broadcasting company to the Westinghouse Electric Corporation for $5.4 billion.
The New York Daily News, having obtained a copy of the redacted November 12th "60 Minutes" script, is the first to name Wigand as the story's source.
With the request of anti-tobacco plaintiffs' lawyers, Jeffrey Wigand provides a deposition in a civil action against tobacco manufacturers brought by the state of Mississippi. The state sought reimbursement for the cost of treating smoking-related illnesses over the years.
1996
January
The Wall Street Journal obtains Wigand's November 1995 Mississippi deposition and publishes it in full on their web site. In the transcript, Wigand supports previously publicized contentions that Brown & Williamson lawyers improperly controlled research programs, in an effort to limit potential liability in injury lawsuits filed against the company.
Lucretia Wigand files for divorce.
February
The Wigand interview airs on 60 Minutes. In the introduction to the story, Mike Wallace explains:
"CBS management wouldn't let us broadcast our original story and our interview with Jeffrey Wigand because they were worried about the possibility of a multi-billion dollar lawsuit against us for tortious interference, that is, interfering with Wigand's confidentiality agreement with Brown & Williamson. But now, things have changed. Last week, the Wall Street Journal got hold of and published a confidential deposition Wigand gave in a Mississippi case, a November deposition that repeated many of the charges he made to us last August. And while a lawsuit is still a possibility, not putting Jeffrey Wigand's story on 60 Minutes no longer is."
At this point, the critical substance of Wigand's testimony has already been reported by other sources.
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