Houston Attorney to Argue ERISA Case at U.S. Supreme Court

Ruling Could Have Far-Reaching Implications for Benefit Plans, Participants

[USPRwire, Mon Oct 06 2008] David A. Furlow, a partner in the Houston office of Thompson & Knight, will present oral arguments before the Supreme Court of the United States on Tuesday, Oct. 7. In representing the plaintiff in the case, Kennedy v. DuPont, Furlow will contend that the DuPont Corporation acted improperly in distributing pension funds to an employee’s ex-wife who had waived her rights to those benefits as part of a divorce decree.

The Court’s decision, expected in mid-2009, will have broad implications for corporations and benefit plan administrators, their employees and in particular for plan participants who divorce their spouse. Based on national data for pension plans and the number of divorces granted each year, the ruling could affect some 300,000 to 400,000 divorcing employees and their heirs annually.

Furlow is representing the estate of the late William P. Kennedy, a Texas resident and longtime participant in a savings and investment plan administered by his employer, DuPont. After his death in 2001, DuPont awarded more than $400,000 in benefits to Mr. Kennedy’s ex-wife, although she had previously waived all rights to her husband’s pension benefits when the couple divorced in 1994. DuPont responded that Mr. Kennedy had never submitted any documents removing or replacing his wife as beneficiary, and that the agreement reached by the couple in their divorce settlement was invalid under the federal ERISA standards that govern employee retirement plans.

As executor of her father’s estate, the couple’s daughter filed suit against the company in federal district court, which later held that Mr. Kennedy’s estate should receive the benefits. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned that decision, finding that ERISA’s “anti-alienation” provisions preempted the state divorce decree.

Countering that appeals court ruling, Furlow will argue that properly executed waivers of benefit rights such as Mrs. Kennedy’s should be upheld and that Mr. Kennedy’s estate is the proper and lawful recipient of his investment funds.

“Divorcing couples should correctly assume that the agreements they reach in state court regarding assets are valid and are recognized under federal common law,” says Furlow. “A decision that these waivers and decrees are not recognized could lead to an ongoing series of unfair and absurd results and deny the rights and expectations of many pension plan participants and beneficiaries.”

The Employee Retirement Security Act of 1974, now known as ERISA, set minimum standards of conduct for private pension plans and includes rules on taxation and disclosure of information in order to protect the interests of employee benefit plan participants and their beneficiaries. Under ERISA, a divorcing spouse must file a Qualified Domestic Relations Order in order to waive the right to the other spouse’s pension benefits.