Court Opinion

ID: 9460411
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 21:49:40.830925+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:36:36.623761
License: Public Domain

CRAVEN, Circuit Judge:
On May 26, 1970, George Edward Walker, Jr. was killed in action in Vietnam. At the time of his death Walker had three insurance policies on his life. *701Two of the policies, in amounts of $1,000 and $9,000, were issued in 1949 and 1950 under the nomenclature of National Service Life Insurance (NSLI); the third policy was under Servicemen’s Group Life Insurance (SGLI) for $10,000 and was issued in 1965. The question presented by this appeal is whether Walker, prior to his death, did any overt act to change the beneficiary of the two NSLI policies from his former wife, Barbara A. Walker Soucy, to his second wife, Margaret Rosa Walker. The district court could find no such act, despite clear evidence that Walker intended that his second wife be the beneficiary under all three policies. Because we believe there was an overt act which, together with the undisputed evidence of Walker’s intent, was sufficient to indicate a change of beneficiary from the first to the second wife, we reverse the judgment of the district court.
At the time the disputed NSLI policies were issued, Florence V. Walker, the mother of the deceased, was named as principal beneficiary. In 1954 Sergeant Walker executed DA Form 41-1 (“Designation or Change of Beneficiary ■ — Servicemen’s Indemnity”) on which he named his wife, Barbara, as principal beneficiary and his mother as contingent beneficiary. Though this was not the form prescribed by the Veteran’s Administration for changing the beneficiary of NSLI policies, the district court found, in the absence of any evidence that Walker was entitled to “servicemen’s indemnity” at the time, that he effectively changed the beneficiary. Bew v. United States, 286 F.2d 570 (4th Cir. 1961).
In 1961 Walker obtained a divorce from Barbara, on grounds of three years separation, in the County Court of Franklin County, Vermont. Custody of their daughter was awarded to the wife. The daughter was subsequently adopted by the wife’s second husband. There is no evidence that Walker had ever seen his first wife or daughter from the date of the divorce until his death nine years later. Walker married his second wife, Margaret, in 1962. One son, Gene, was born to the marriage; Walker also adopted Margaret’s son from a previous marriage. The SGLI policy issued in 1965 named Margaret and the two sons as beneficiaries.
At trial Margaret testified that on numerous occasions her husband told her that if anything should happen to him she and the sons would get $20,000 worth of life insurance. This testimony is substantiated by the affidavits of two neighbors of the Walkers at Fort Bragg and by the testimony of a former agent for Metropolitan Life Insurance Company who had discussed Walker’s insurance situation with him on two occasions before he began his second tour of duty in Vietnam.1 Further evidence introduced at trial consisted of a power of attorney executed by Walker in favor of Margaret prior to his departure for Vietnam in December, 1969,2 and a DA Form 41 (“Record of Emergency Data”) which Walker filled out while in a combat zone in Vietnam in February, 1970. This latter form indicated that Margaret K. Walker was the beneficiary for unpaid pay and allowances and for allotments if Walker were to become missing in action. Under the blanks reserved for “Insurance data” only “SGLI” was written. There was no mention of the NSLI policies.
*702In Roberts v. United States, 157 F.2d 906 (4th Cir. 1946), this court said that “in war risk insurance cases involving change of beneficiary the courts brush aside all legal technicalities in order to effectuate the manifest intention of the insured . . . .”157 F.2d at 909. Subsequently we have held that intent alone is not sufficient, Kluge v. United States, 206 F.2d 344 (4th Cir. 1953), but must be accompanied by some overt act directed toward effectuating that intent. See, e. g., Bew v. United States, 286 F.2d 570 (4th Cir. 1969). We adhere to that viewpoint.
The idea of brushing aside legal technicalities in order to do substantial justice is very appealing. What makes this ease difficult of decision is our incompetence to assay collateral effect. If we create a rule of subjective intent, we inevitably also create administrative problems that may affect thousands of beneficiaries under these policies. To adopt a pure-intention rule might delay payment in innumerable cases and might well result in the cumbersome procedure of interpleader with the government depositing the money in a fund for disbursement by the administrative judge or the district court after an evidentiary hearing as to the intention of the deceased soldier. Getting Rosa Walker the monies that her husband intended her to have is a worthwhile endeavor, but it may not be accomplished properly at a price of encumbering the administrative process for thousands of other claimants. We think, therefore, we must continue to insist upon an overt act and decline to adopt a rule of intention that may be sustained simply by oral testimony. We think the Fifth Circuit has balanced, as well as it can be done, the need for reasonably rapid processing of claims against the wish to assure that in as many cases as feasible the actual beneficiary is the one intended by the deceased serviceman. In Smith v. United States, 421 F.2d 634 (5th Cir. 1970), the court stated:
In those cases where the proof of intent is clear and convincing, the rationale is that a lesser quantum of proof is required to show the affirmative act to carry out the intent to make the change.
421 F.2d at 635. In this case the proof of intent, as in Smith, is “clear and convincing,” as the district judge seemed to recognize.3 But the lower court understandably felt constrained by our opinion in Collins v. Collins, 378 F. 2d 1020 (4th Cir. 1967). In Collins the issue was precisely the same as in the case at bar. The serviceman in Collins told his wife “that he had ‘willed’ his insurance to her and that she would be taken care of for the rest of her life.” 378 F.2d at 1020. The alleged overt act was the execution of a “Record of Emergency Data” form similar to that which Walker filled out. Collins designated his wife as beneficiary of his unpaid pay and allowances, and, in the blank designated for listing insurance policies, listed “NSLI”. He did not, however, fill in the space on the form in which he might have listed the beneficiary of this insurance. On this basis the court found there was no overt act since “the execution of the form is equally consistent with an intention on the part of the insured to leave his father and sister as the designated beneficiaries as with an intention to change the designated beneficiary to his wife.” 378 F.2d at 1020.
We think, admittedly with some hesitation, that the case presently before us is factually distinguishable from Collins. The showing of intent by the appellant here is significantly more convincing since the testimony of his wife, who stands to benefit from the finding of a change of beneficiary, is supported by affidavits from neighbors and the testimony of an insurance agent whereas in Collins the wife’s testimony was ap*703parently the only evidence of intent. The form executed by Collins differed from that filled out by Walker in that the later DA Form 41 called only for “insurance data” rather than calling to the soldier’s attention the difference between SGLI and NSLI and providing a space for the listing of beneficiaries under the policies enumerated. Furthermore, the “equally consistent” conclusion in Collins that the serviceman intended for his father and sister to benefit from his insurance is absent here. The government does not seriously contend that Walker intended that the NSLI proceeds should go to a wife with whom he had not lived in twelve years and from whom he had been divorced and had not seen for nine years. That Walker had no such intention is further strengthened by the obligation of support which he owed to his two sons.
It is quite apparent that long before George Walker went to Vietnam he believed he had made his second wife and his two sons the beneficiaries of all three of his insurance policies, either because of the mere fact of his divorce from his first wife or because of some action taken by him of which there is no record. The acts of granting his second wife a general power of attorney and filling out his Record of Emergency Data, DA Form 41, are certainly consistent with this belief.
Because we believe a less overt act is necessary to change a beneficiary in war risk insurance cases where clear and convincing proof of intent is made, we treat these acts together as sufficient to constitute the overt act necessary to find that George Walker changed the beneficiary of his NSLI policies prior to his death.
Reversed.

. On direct examination the agent, Charles King, Jr., testified as follows:
Q. What statements did Mr. Walker make to you about his insurance?
A. Indicated to me that he had, that the $20,000 available to him through the Army would be payable to his wife and children should something happen to him.
Q. And did he say to whom it was payable?
A. To his wife, Margaret Walker, and his children.

. The power of attorney was general and included the right to act as his attorney-in-fact or proxy “in respect to any policy of insurance on [his] life” excepting any right to change the beneficiary.

. In his “Memorandum of Decision” the district judge stated: “From this evidence the court has no hesitance in finding the insured fully intended that his widow, Margaret, should receive the proceeds of all of this insurance at his death.”