Travelers Insurance Company v. Lewis

531 P.2d 484, 1975 Utah LEXIS 817

• Court: Utah Supreme Court
• Decided: January 24, 1975
• Docket: 13662
• Status: Published

Opinions

ELLETT, Justice:

During his lifetime and while he was married to his first wife, William E. Lavender took out an insurance policy on his own life and named his wife as beneficiary. Matrimonial difficulties beset the marriage, and the wife subsequently secured a decree of divorce containing the following language:

6. The defendant is hereby ordered to maintain in full force and effect the $5,000.00 life insurance policy on the life of the defendant with the plaintiff as beneficiary and the three minor children of the parties as contingent beneficiaries in the event the plaintiff remarries or dies.

Both parties remarried, and Mr. Lavender, contrary to the order above set out, changed the beneficiary of the policy to be his second wife. He and the second wife were thereafter divorced, and she has since remarried and is now Bernice Lewis, one of the defendants herein. The divorce decree between Bernice and Mr. Lavender makes no mention of the insurance policy.

When Mr. Lavender died, a dispute arose between Bernice Lewis and the children as to whom the proceeds of the policy should be paid. The insurer, plaintiff herein, brought this suit in the nature of a bill of interpleader and paid the money into court. Based upon a stipulated set of facts, the trial court granted summary judgment in favor of the children. This appeal followed.

The first wife, mother of the defendant children, makes no claim to the proceeds of the policy and was not joined as a party to the suit. Since she remarried, she has no right to the proceeds; besides, she is no longer named as the beneficiary. Despite this, the dissent in this case would award the proceeds of the policy to her.

This is an interpleader suit for the court to decide between various contending claimants to a fund in which the plaintiff has no interest. If the plaintiff herein is willing to take its chances on paying twice,¹ we should not worry about it. We do our duty by deciding which of the named claimants has the better claim to the money.

' It is to be noted that the court in the first divorce suit had personal jurisdiction over William E. Lavender and under our statute² had continuing jurisdiction over him and his property. It ordered him to maintain the policy with his wife as beneficiary and the children as contingent beneficiaries in case the wife died or remarried.

The insurance company, being aware of this, properly brought the present suit, thereby placing the trial court in a position to exercise its equitable powers to deal with the rights of the parties under the two divorce decrees.

A court of equity can and should regard as done that which ought to be done; and, similarly, it can and should regard as not having been done that which ought not to have been done. Therefore, in judging the rights of these contending parties, the court should have disregarded the forbidden attempted change of beneficiary whereby the second wife was substituted for the first wife. There is ample authority to sustain the ruling of the trial court in holding that the provisions of a divorce decree control the disposition of the proceeds of an insurance policy between contending beneficiaries.³ Since the first wife remarried and thereby, under the first divorce decree, prevented herself from taking the proceeds, and since that decree has never been amended, the contingent beneficiaries are entitled to the proceeds of the policy.

The fact that they were designated as “minor children” is no reason to deny them their rights. The term as used in the decree of divorce was merely descriptive of their status at the time, and we think it was not meant to make them contingent beneficiaries only during their minority.

We think that the trial court ruled properly in granting summary judgment to the children; and since the law supports that ruling, we should, and hereby do, affirm the judgment. Costs are awarded to the respondents.

CALLISTER, C. J., and CROCKETT and TUCKETT, JJ., concur.

1 . The likelihood of which we are unable to see.

2 . Section 30-3-5, U.C.A.1953 (1973 Pocket Supplement).

3 . Peckham v. Met. Life Ins. Co., 415 F.2d 312 (10 Cir. 1969) ; Equitable Life Assurance Soc. v. Wilkins, D.C., 44 F.Supp. 594; Goodrich v. Mass. Mut. Life Ins. Co., 34 Tenn.App. 516, 240 S.W.2d 263 (1951) ; Williams v. Williams, 276 Ala. 43, 158 So.2d 901 (Ala.1963).