• 4/15/2004
  • Twin Falls
  • Chad Baldwin

Like many aspiring rodeo cowboys, Kent Cooper began chewing tobacco at a young age — 13, to be exact. For close to 30 years — most of those while he was on the pro rodeo circuit — Copenhagen was his brand of choice, until friends say he dropped the habit four or five years ago. But the lifestyle change came too late for one of Idaho’s most successful rodeo cowboys, attorneys for his ex-wife say. The Albion resident, a 13-time qualifier for the National Finals Rodeo in saddle bronc riding, was diagnosed with throat cancer in April 2002 and died later that year in Burley at the age of 47. Now, Cooper’s ex-wife, Susan Smith, on behalf of their son, Will, 9, is suing the manufacturer of Copenhagen. The lawsuit contends that the U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co. and its predecessors “hooked” Cooper on the product, and that they falsely stated for years that chewing tobacco wasn’t addictive and there was no proof that it caused harm to people.

What’s particularly intriguing about the case is the close relationship between the smokeless tobacco industry and the sport of rodeo. The U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co. is a major sponsor of both the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association and the National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association, according to their Web sites. Many professional rodeo cowboys have individual sponsorship deals with the company. Some rodeo broncs and bulls are named after chewing tobacco products. Country singer Chris LeDoux, a rodeo icon, even recorded a song with the lyrics, “Copenhagen, it makes me feel so good.”

In the lawsuit filed earlier this month in U.S. District Court in Boise, Smith, who lives in California, asks for a jury trial on her request for damages related to Cooper’s death for their son. The complaint alleges that Cooper died as a direct result of his use of Copenhagen snuff. “Kent Cooper began using defendants’ products as a child, and on information and belief, he began using the product because he wanted to emulate the ‘models’ used by defendants in their advertisements and promotions, and specifically to emulate rodeo athletes …,” the lawsuit states. “Defendants could achieve their purposes only be convincing users and potential users of their products that spit tobacco does not cause disease … and by continuing to cause children to begin using their products, with the expectation that by the time such children had sufficient judgment to make an informed decision about use of tobacco, they would be confirmed nicotine addicts,” the complaint adds.

A spokesman for the Connecticut-based U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co., Mike Bazinet, said Wednesday the company hadn’t yet been served notice of the lawsuit and therefore had no comment. The lawsuit also contends that college rodeo cowboys regularly were provided with free “samples” of smokeless tobacco products, such as Copenhagen and Skoal. Reached by telephone Wednesday, Smith said Cooper had a ready supply of snuff during his days on the pro rodeo circuit, a career that ran from the mid-1970s to 1993. The couple was married in for 11 years before divorcing in about 1997, she said.

“It was always available to him whenever he wanted at no cost,” she said. “He did try to stop, but the longest he could go without was two or three days. To my knowledge, he never did stop.” The lawsuit, however, indicates that Cooper quit using snuff several years before his death. Former rodeo cowboy Mickey Young of Buhl, who identified himself as a close friend of Cooper, said he quit the habit four or five years ago. The complaint contends that Copenhagen is more addictive than almost any other brand of moist snuff available in the United States, in part because it contains relatively high amounts of nicotine and because of the way it is packaged.
The manufacturer has known since the 1960s that use of “spit tobacco” causes a serious risk of oral, throat and other cancers but for many years denied there was proof of a connection, the lawsuit says. In addition, the company has known for years of ways to alter Copenhagen to reduce its addictive and harmful properties, but it has not done so.

Smith’s attorney, Jon Ferguson of Bainbridge Island, Wash., said he will have to prove that Cooper’s cancer was caused by smokeless tobacco use. “The kind of cancer he had is caused by virtually nothing else,” Ferguson said. “The other risk factors are drinking and cigarette smoke, and Kent was not a big drinker, and he didn’t smoke cigarettes.” Ferguson said Cooper did share some of the blame for his illness. “He was a grown man. He knew what he was doing — at least later on, when there were warning labels. He undoubtedly saw baseball players with their jaws cut off — I’m sure that had something to do with him quitting,” Ferguson said. “We’re all responsible for our own choices, but on the other hand, the purveyors of dangerous drugs have a duty not to addict people who are 13 years old. They’re responsible to produce the least hazardous product they can, and to not alter it to make it more hazardous.”

Young, a retired champion bareback bronc rider and former rodeo stock contractor, said he was approached numerous times to sign a sponsorship agreement with the manufacturer of Copenhagen and Skoal, but he decided against it — even though such arrangements can be lucrative for rodeo cowboys.
“I didn’t want to be on their team because of the message it sent to young people,” he said. “You could make a lot more rodeoing for them than you could for anybody else, but at the same time, there was a moral issue there. I just didn’t believe in those kinds of sponsors.” Young is particularly critical of the smokeless tobacco industry’s involvement with college rodeo. At the same time, he said he’s not sure the company should be held liable for health problems caused by the products. “Copenhagen/Skoal has a right to market its product, and if someone is dumb enough to buy it, that’s their prerogative,” Young said. He said he sees Smith’s lawsuit as exploitation of her ex-husband in an attempt to make money.
Smith said that’s not the case, pointing out that any financial award would go to her son, not to her. “This is all about a 9-year-old boy. It has nothing to do with me,” she said. “My main focus is that a 9-year-old boy will grow up without a father because of a product that killed him that’s readily available for everybody.”

A lawsuit filed on behalf of the son of the late Albion rodeo cowboy Kent Cooper is similar to those filed by cigarette users against the tobacco industry. The industry has faced more than 1,000 individual claims, along with class-action lawsuits, from people who said they were harmed by cigarettes, according to The Associated Press. Juries have awarded millions and sometimes billions of dollars to individual smokers. Far fewer claims — by some accounts, no more than 50 or so — have been filed against smokeless tobacco companies. The U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co. in 2002 settled a lawsuit with a Florida man who claimed his use of smokeless tobacco gave him tongue cancer. The amount of the settlement was unspecified, but at the time the deal was called the first case of a tobacco firm agreeing to pay an individual for injuries caused by its products. Attorney Jon Ferguson said he understands that settlement remains unique today — cigarette manufacturers have never settled a case with an individual smoker, to prevent a possible influx of new claims. The U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co. has reached settlement agreements with a number of states preventing those governments from pursuing further litigation. As part of the agreements, according to the company’s Web site, it has provided millions of dollars for programs to reduce young people’s use of tobacco products, restricted its advertising methods, and agreed to not distribute free samples of its products, except in adult-only facilities or in conjunction with adult retail purchases of tobacco products.