Source: https://case-law.vlex.com/vid/473-u-s-134-604994462
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 15:47:43+00:00

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[a]ny person who is a fiduciary with respect to a plan who breaches any of the responsibilities, obligations, or duties imposed upon fiduciaries by this title shall be personally liable to make good to such plan any losses to the plan resulting from such breach, and to restore to such plan any profits of such fiduciary which have been made through use of assets of the plan by the fiduciary, and shall be subject to such other equitable or remedial relief as the court may deem appropriate, including removal of such fiduciary.
Held: Section 409(a) does not provide a cause of action for extracontractual damages to a beneficiary caused by improper or untimely processing of benefit claims. Pp. 139-148.
to make good to such plan any losses to the plan . . . and to restore to such plan any profits of such fiduciary which have been made through use of assets of the plan.
[105 S.Ct. 3087] (b) Nor can a private cause of action for extra-contractual damages be implied. While respondent is a member of the class for whose benefit ERISA was enacted and, in view of the preemptive effect of ERISA, there is no state law impediment to implying a remedy, legislative intent and consistency with the legislative scheme support the conclusion that Congress did not intend the judiciary to imply such a cause of action. The civil enforcement provisions of § 502(a) provide strong evidence that Congress did not intend to authorize other remedies that it did not incorporate expressly. Pp. 145-148.
STEVENS, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which BURGER, C.J., and POWELL, REHNQUIST, and O'CONNOR, JJ., joined. BRENNAN, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which WHITE, MARSHALL, and BLACKMUN, JJ., joined, post, p. 148.
The question presented for decision is whether, under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), a fiduciary to an employee benefit plan may be held personally liable to a plan participant or beneficiary for extracontractual compensatory or punitive damages caused by improper or untimely processing of benefit claims.
Respondent Doris Russell, a claims examiner for petitioner Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company (hereafter petitioner), is a beneficiary under two employee benefit plans administered by petitioner for eligible employees. Both plans are funded from the general assets of petitioner, and both are governed by ERISA.
(1) ignored readily available medical evidence documenting respondent's disability, (2) applied unwarrantedly strict eligibility standards, and (3) deliberately took 132 days to process her claim, in violation of regulations promulgated by the Secretary of Labor.2 The interruption of benefit payments allegedly forced respondent's disabled husband to cash out his retirement savings which, in turn, aggravated the psychological condition that caused respondent's back ailment. Accordingly, she sued petitioner in the California Superior Court pleading various causes of action based on state law and on ERISA.
ERISA bars any claims for extra-contractual damages and punitive damages arising [105 S.Ct. 3088] out of the original denial of plaintiff's claims for benefits under the Salary Continuance Plan and the subsequent review thereof.
App. to Pet. for Cert. 29a.
488. The court concluded that this violation gave rise to a cause of action under § 409(a) that could be asserted by a plan beneficiary pursuant to § 502(a)(2). Id. at 489-490. It read the authorization in § 409(a) of "such other equitable or remedial relief as the court may deem appropriate" as giving it "wide discretion as to the damages to be awarded," including compensatory and punitive damages. Id. at 490-491.
including "damages for mental or emotional distress." Id. at 490. Moreover, the liability under § 409(a) "is against the fiduciary personally, not the plan." Id. at 490, n. 8.
The Court of Appeals also held that punitive damages could be recovered under § 409(a), although it decided that such an award is permitted only if the fiduciary "acted with actual malice or wanton indifference to the rights of a participant or beneficiary." Id. at 492. The court believed that this result was supported by the text of § 409(a) and by the congressional purpose to provide broad remedies to redress and prevent violations of the Act.
We granted certiorari, 469 U.S. 816 (1984), to review both the compensatory and punitive components of the Court of Appeals' holding that § 409 authorizes recovery of extracontractual damages.4 Respondent defends the judgment of the Court of Appeals both on its reasoning that § 409 provides an express basis for extracontractual damages, as well as by arguing that, in any event, such a private remedy should be inferred under the analysis employed in Cort v. Ash, 422 U.S. 66, 78 (1975). We reject both arguments.

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