NIXON SAYS STATE HASN'T PAID TOBACCO LAWYERS

Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon says the state hasn't paid a dime to private lawyers who represented the state in litigation against the tobacco industry.

At a press conference in St. Louis Tuesday, state Sen. Peter Kinder said Nixon "agreed to pay" 48 private lawyers $479 million in legal fees or an average of $10 million per lawyer.

An article in Wednesday's Southeast Missourian mistakenly said the lawyers had been paid.

"The state has not paid a dime to the attorneys handling this case," Nixon said Thursday. "In fact, these attorneys have borne the entire cost of the litigation, saving the state millions of dollars.

"If and when the courts give final approval to the tobacco settlement, attorneys fees will be paid by the tobacco company and will not be taken from the $6.7 billion the state is to receive upon finality of this case," Nixon said in a prepared statement.

"As we begin a new campaign season, it is disingenuous for Republicans to now seek political gain by misrepresenting the specifics of a settlement and to attempt to compare this important legal fight to the illegal activities of the former Republican administration in Jefferson City.

Nixon said state Republican Party leader John Hancock said in November 1998 that the tobacco settlement was "nothing short of historic."

"It gives Missouri a chance to rake in more than $6 billion without losing a single penny of it to legal fees," Nixon quoted Hancock as saying.

Missouri is one of four states that hasn't settled all legal challenges to the tobacco settlement; the money remains in escrow.

Five months before signing a settlement agreement with the tobacco companies, Nixon hired a Springfield, Mo., lawyer to handle the state's case. The agreement between Tom Strong and Nixon's office is worth 7 percent of the state's settlement, Kinder said.

Kinder said the lawyers should be paid by the Legislature from tobacco settlement money

Nixon said, "The decision to file this case, to hire outside counsel and to settle this case were all made in a public fashion and after thorough review with bipartisan leaders."

Nixon said he would "work aggressively with the best legal team in the country" to secure the tobacco money for Missouri.

Kinder has called on Gov. Mel Carnahan to immediately disclose all records indicating how much the lawyers would be paid and how much work they had done. But a spokesman for the governor said that wasn't Carnahan's duty.

"The governor's office didn't hire the tobacco lawyers. That wasn't our duty. That fell to the attorney general," said Carnahan spokesman Jerry Nachtigal.

"Sen. Kinder may request that the governor open all records and payment schedules, but I think he knows full well that the governor had nothing to do with the hiring of attorneys to handle the tobacco settlement and it is not our issue," he said.