The Australian law firm behind the first successful tobacco claim outside the US is to ask the Australian courts to release documents that it says support claims of an international document destruction policy at British American Tobacco (BAT).

As Legal Week went to press Melbourne-based firm Slater & Gordon was understood to be poised to make an application for documents discovered in the landmark action to be put into the public domain.

The documents are also likely to throw further light on claims by the judge in the case that one of its key features was the involvement of an "an army of litigation lawyers from several countries".

The impending application follows a request to the firm by the US Department of Justice for evidence in the case, which saw Victoria Supreme Court judge Justice Geoffrey Eames strike out BAT's defence after ruling that BAT and its lawyers, Clayton Utz, had subverted the discovery process.

Following the ruling, terminally ill cancer victim and mother-of-four, Rolah McCabe, was awarded a$700,000 (£259,000) in damages.

Slater & Gordon wants permission from the courts to release documents obtained during the discovery process leading up to the landmark action.

The firm has already issued a lengthy statement on its website claiming that document destruction occurred across BAT's international operations.

The case itself, which is already being dubbed 'Australia's Enron', features the involvement of an array of international in-house lawyers and outside advisers.

In his judgment, in a section entitled "a multitude of lawyers", Eames goes out of his way to highlight the role played by lawyers in the document destruction strategy of BAT's Australian subsidiary.

"One outstanding feature of this case is the extent to which, after 1985, the terms of the document retention policy, and the implementation of a programme of destruction of documents, were the product of advice, decision and supervision by an army of litigation lawyers from several countries and being both retained private practitioners and in-house lawyers," he said.

The judge added: "The relationship between the defendant and its retained solicitors was so close that solicitors employed by private firms sometimes became employees of Wills [BAT's Australian subsidiary] and then continued to work alongside members of their former firm, and employees of one of the legal firms sometimes spent months working on the premises of Wills."

For Lovells response, see Lovells hits back over BAT claims (25 April), and Lovells (25 April)