ERISA – Insurance Benefits Beneficiary

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Emma Cehovic-Dixneuf v. Lisa Wong

Case No.: 17-1532

Officials: BAUER, ROVNER, and HAMILTON, Circuit Judges.

Focus: ERISA – Insurance Benefits Beneficiary

The federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) requires administrators of employee benefit plans to comply with the documents that control the plans. 29 U.S.C. § 1104(a)(1)(D). In the case of life insurance policies, that means death benefits are paid to the beneficiary designated in the policy, notwithstanding equitable arguments or claims that others might assert. In this case, the deceased employee was Georges Cehovic, whose employer offered its employees an insurance benefit plan through ReliaStar Life Insurance Company. Georges had two policies under the plan with ReliaStar: a basic life insurance policy with a death benefit of $263,000, and a supplemental life insurance policy with a death benefit of $788,000. On both policies, Georges listed his sister, plaintiff Emma Cehovic‐Dixneuf, as the sole and primary beneficiary. After Georges died, his ex‐wife, defendant Lisa Wong, claimed that she and the child she had with Georges were entitled to the death benefits from the supplemental policy. Any equitable arguments Wong might make can gain no traction, however, if the supplemental life insurance policy is covered by ERISA.

The district court granted summary judgment for plaintiff Cehovic‐Dixneuf, finding that the supplemental life insurance policy is indeed covered by ERISA. We affirm. Defendant Wong failed to offer evidence to the district court showing any genuine issue of any fact material to the case. She did not present her evidentiary objections to Cehovic‐Dixneuf’s evidence in the district court when she could and should have.

We see no abuse of discretion by the district judge in denying the Rule 59(e) motion. In denying a motion to reconsider a summary judgment opinion, in a passage quoted by other courts literally hundreds of times, the late Judge Shadur wrote thirty years ago that “this Court’s opinions are not intended as mere first drafts, subject to revision and reconsideration at a litigant’s pleasure.” Quaker Alloy Casting Co. v. Gulfco Industries, Inc., 123 F.R.D. 282, 288 (N.D. Ill. 1988) (denying motion to reconsider certain conclusions in summary judgment decision); see also, e.g., Caisse Nationale de Credit Agricole v. CBI Industries, Inc., 90 F.3d 1264, 1270 (7th Cir. 1996) (“A party seeking to defeat a motion for summary judgment is required to ‘wheel out all its artillery to defeat it.’”), quoting Employers Ins. of Wausau v. Bodi‐Wachs Aviation Ins. Agency, Inc., 846 F. Supp. 677, 685 (N.D. Ill. 1994); Fast Tek Group, LLC v. Plastech Engineered Products, Inc., No. 1:05‐cv‐1868, 2006 WL 3409171, *5 (S.D. Ind. Nov. 27, 2006) (denying motion to reconsider grant of summary judgment relying on new arguments and new evidence); Pickett v. Prince, 5 F. Supp. 2d 595, 596–97 (N.D. Ill. 1998) (collecting cases and denying motion to reconsider grant of summary judgment based on argument not raised in original briefing). Having decided the motion before it correctly, on the briefs and record before it, the district court was not required to vacate that decision to allow Wong to start all over again on the basis of arguments she could and should have made earlier.

Affirmed

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.