ALBANY - New York??s attorney general is intensifying efforts to prevent the movement of tax-free cigarettes from Indian-owned companies in Canada to New York Indian reservations, The Buffalo News reports.

Attorney General Eric Schneiderman was expected to file a lawsuit yesterday targeting a cigarette plant located on the Six Nations of the Grand River Indian reservation in Ontario and a businessman from the Seneca Nation of Indians, located within New York, to sell tax-free cigarettes marketed under the "Seneca" name.

Schneiderman is seeking to break up the tax-free cigarette sales by Grand River Enterprises to the Native Wholesale Supply (NWS) in New York. According to The Buffalo News, in an eight-month period ending last July, both companies moved at least 687 million Seneca brand cigarettes into the tax-free tobacco market. Sales to NWS totaled $85 million, which should have resulted in the state collecting $13 million in taxes.

The Seneca brand distribution network violates state and federal laws, according to the lawsuit. Industry executives have estimated the Seneca brand sales could top 10 billion cigarettes annually.