A lawsuit that alleges the maker of Marlboro Lights used deceptive trade practices and false advertising when it marketed its cigarettes as "light" can proceed in Minnesota as a class-action claim, the state Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday.

The 45-page ruling by the three-judge panel sends the 2001 lawsuit against Philip Morris back to Hennepin County District Court.

The class would include people who bought Marlboro Lights in Minnesota for their personal use from 1972 through November 2004. The number of people in the class and the amount of damages they would seek was not immediately available Tuesday. The plaintiffs are seeking refunds of money they spent on the cigarettes.

In a statement, Philip Morris said it was considering its options for an appeal. The company said it believes class-action status is inappropriate because the circumstances of each smoker are different.

The district court denied the request for class certification in 2004, saying it was necessary to look at each person's reasons for smoking light cigarettes and the manner in which they smoked them. But later that year, the district court reversed itself and certified the class, saying that because the injury being claimed was economic, not physical, all class members suffered similar injury.

A federal judge granted class-action status to Netflix Inc. subscribers in their lawsuit against the company and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. over DVDs.

US District Judge Phyllis Hamilton said that the subscribers bringing suit against the companies in 2009 were “united by common and overlapping issues of fact and law,’’ in an order dated Dec. 23 and filed in federal court in Oakland, Calif.

Wal-Mart and the plaintiffs reached a preliminary settlement of the lawsuit that could pay them as much as $40 million in cash or equivalents, according to a motion filed Dec. 14. A hearing on that motion will be Feb. 9. It doesn’t include Netflix.

The plaintiffs charged that Netflix and Wal-Mart conspired in 2005 to divide the market for selling and renting DVDs to reduce competition. The companies formed an agreement in which Wal-Mart.com would stop renting DVDs online and Netflix wouldn’t offer them for sale.

Town officials may file a class-action lawsuit against the state for what they say is inadequate funding of the district's special education program.

A task force reviewing Framingham structural deficit asked earlier this month for Town Manager Julian Suso and Superintendent Steven Hiersche to look into filing a lawsuit, Hiersche said yesterday.

"We haven't had time to talk about it," he said, adding he expected discussions to begin in the new year.

The task force said a potential lawsuit would be in response to the state's underfunding of the town's special education services. Like many towns, Framingham had its special education "circuit-breaker" reimbursement cut by the state last year, and Suso said Framingham historically has been underfunded in the state's education funding formula.

"The playing field is not level," he said.

Hierche said the lawsuit also could consider other recent cuts to local aid.

"(The Structural Deficit Review Task Force) is looking at a lot of things the state has backed away from," he said.

Suso said the aim of the lawsuit would be to make the state's funding formulas more equitable to Framingham, though there is no specific figure being sought at this time.

A coalition of environmental and Native American groups on Monday sued the California Department of Fish and Game over permits issued to build 21,000 homes on Los Angeles County's last major tract of undeveloped land.

The coalition, which filed the suit in San Francisco County Superior Court, alleges that fish and game officials violated state environmental codes in granting permits Dec. 3 for the controversial Newhall Ranch development.

"It is appalling that the Department of Fish and Game, the trustee for all of California's wildlife, approved ecological destruction on this scale," said John Buse, a senior attorney for the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the plaintiffs. "Far less damaging options were available, but the department brushed them aside."

Fish and Game spokesman Andrew Hughan said he could not comment because the department has not yet seen the lawsuit, but in an earlier statement department officials said the approved plan will preserve 70 percent of the nearly 14,000-acre area as natural open space.

That space includes preserves to protect 76 percent of the rare San Fernando Valley spineflower and 93 percent of the Santa Clara River corridor.

Developers must also establish a $6 million endowment for preservation efforts.

"Hundreds of people, including biologists, botanists, hydrologists and other scientists, worked together to shape this biologically innovative project, and the end result ensures the protection of this site's unique natural resources," said Ed Pert, South Coast regional manager.

Pacific Investment Management Company is paying $92 million to settle a class-action lawsuit that accuses it of manipulating the price of 10-year Treasuries back in 2005.

The lawsuit was filed by two investors that had taken short positions in the futures contracts. Breakwater Trading and the other plantiffs had bet that the market value of the notes would decline. However, they wound up paying prices that were "articially high," according to the plantiffs because Pimco scooped up large amounts of the T-notes, according to a report by the Los Angeles Times

"PIMCO's position is that all such trades were properly designed to secure best execution for its clients; that by lending cheapest-to-deliver notes back into the market it eliminated any concerns," PIMCO said in a press release.

Two San Francisco newspapers engaged in a lengthy legal battle over predatory pricing have settled their dispute outside of court.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that the Bay Guardian and SF Weekly announced a settlement Monday but did not disclose its terms.

The Guardian filed an antitrust lawsuit against SF Weekly in 2004, accusing the paper of slashing advertising prices to drive the Guardian out of business. A San Francisco judge in 2008 ordered SF Weekly to pay $21 million to its rival.

SF Weekly has said its low-cost ads reflected fair competition and did not violate antitrust laws.

Both alternative weeklies are distributed for free and rely on ad revenue to continue operating.

Dairy processor Dean Foods Co. will pay $30 million and take other undisclosed actions to settle allegations by a group of dairy farmers that it had monopolized the milk industry in the Northeast.

The settlement does not include another major player in the national dairy industry that had been named in the original lawsuit.

"This settlement with Dean will help our dairy farmers who have been hurting for too long," said Burlington attorney Andrew Manitsky, who represents Vermont dairy farmers involved in the case.

Manitsky said he couldn't provide any details of the settlement until the case has been submitted to a federal judge in Burlington, which is expected to happen next week.

Dallas-based Dean Foods revealed the settlement in a submission Thursday to the Securities and Exchange Commission.

It said the company had agreed to the payment as a way to settle the "purported class action antitrust lawsuit." It also said it would agree with other terms and conditions for its "raw milk procurement activities at certain of its processing plants located in the northeast." It did not elaborate.