Judge blocks DC man from smoking in his own home... at least for a while

A Superior Court judge has decided to temporarily prohibit one Washington, DC resident from smoking in his home after his next-door neighbors filed a suit claiming the smoke causes harm to their family when it seeps into their property.

|
Francois Mori/AP Photo/File
A man flicks ashes from his cigarette over a dustbin in Shanghai January 10, 2014. Now, rising public awareness about the hazards of smoking, coupled with China's hardening stance on smoking in public, is opening up an opportunity for e-cigarettes to make inroads into the world's biggest tobacco market. Picture taken January 10, 2014. REUTERS/Aly Song (CHINA - Tags: POLITICS BUSINESS) :rel:d:bm:GF2EA1E0V7Y01

Smoke a cigarette in the privacy of your home? For one Washington, DC man, that’s no longer an option – at least for a while.

A Superior Court judge has issued a temporary injunction barring Edwin Gray from smoking inside the Northeast DC home his family has owned for 50 years, WLJA-TV reported.

Justice Ronna L. Beck’s decision comes after Mr. Gray’s next-door neighbors – a couple with one child and another on the way – filed in December a civil lawsuit claiming Gray’s cigarette smoke causes harm to their family when it seeps into their home through a hole in the basement. In addition to the ban, the claim asks for $500,000 in damages. 

The case highlights an ongoing movement in the District and around the country against cigarette smoking in places where it might cause harm to others, in some cases overruling what seems to be an individual’s right to smoke.

Judge Beck, in issuing the injunction, reportedly agreed with the plaintiffs’ claim.

“We were floored,” Gray’s sister, Mozella Johnson, told the WLJA in response to the temporary ruling.

Yet the decision to grant the injunction is not all that surprising, says John Banzhaf, a professor of public interest law at George Washington University and founder of the nonprofit Action on Smoking and Health.  

The general public – including tobacco companies – now acknowledges that smoking is bad for one's health, with some even agreeing secondhand smoke can be hazardous, Mr. Banzhaf says. Indeed, as of January this year, 36 states and the District of Columbia have laws that ban smoking in public places. In Washington, DC, bars, restaurants, and workplaces have been smoke-free areas since 2006.

But what about the individual’s right to engage in a chosen activity, particularly in one’s own home? As Gray told WLJA: “You want me to stop what I’ve been doing in my house, all my life?”

He and his sister have told the network that they intend to fight the injunction, which stops any family or guests from smoking cigarettes, cigars, or marijuana in their home – though they can step outside for a smoke. 

Smokers’ associations have also continued to fight legislation that prohibits smoking. They cite discrimination, heavy taxation, and widespread anti-smoking campaigns that they claim are based on junk science.

“Public health advocates who claim one out of every three, or even one out of every two, smokers will die from a smoking-related illness are grossly exaggerating the real threat,” Joseph L. Bast, president of the conservative and libertarian organization The Heartland Institute, wrote in a 2006 book defending smoking.

One of the most outspoken critics of smoking bans is Audrey Silk, founder of the New York City-based Citizens Lobbying Against Smokers’ Harassment, or CLASH. 

In an interview with The Gothamist, Ms. Silk, a former police officer, said that most smokers are informed adults exercising their right to make a decision about their personal health.

She also agreed with Mr. Bast's claims, saying that “anyone who has done their homework knows that there is nothing legitimate about the science that [people behind anti-smoking campaigns] are producing to push their agenda.”

“It is activist driven science,” she said.

A study published last month in the British journal BioMed Central suggest that the numbers cited by smoking advocates like Bast and Silk might actually be too low: A study of more than 200,000 smokers in Australia published last month concluded that up to two-thirds of deaths in current smokers can be attributed to smoking.

And according to a 2014 report by the US Surgeon General, some 2.5 million nonsmokers in the United States have died from exposure to secondhand smoke in the preceding five decades.

Banzhaf notes, too, that the constitutional right to smoke does not exist. He adds that in the city of Burbank, Calif., smoking is prohibited almost everywhere, including sidewalks, with the exception of designated smoking areas.

In 2013, one resident smoker filed a lawsuit against the city of Clayton, Mo., after officials passed an ordinance that banned smoking in city buildings, parks, and playgrounds on the grounds of public health and safety, litter reduction, and preserving the aesthetics of city property, the  Monitor reported.

The plaintiff argued that the ban violated his right to light up in a public area, but a federal court rejected the suit, saying, “We decline [the] invitation to declare smoking a fundamental right.”

More recently, the state of New York also upheld a smoking ban in state parks, which had been overturned by a lower court, according to CBS New York.

“Attitudes have changed,” Banzhaf says, “and they have changed rather dramatically.”

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Judge blocks DC man from smoking in his own home... at least for a while
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/USA-Update/2015/0311/Judge-blocks-DC-man-from-smoking-in-his-own-home-at-least-for-a-while
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe