Court Opinion

ID: 9684668
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 14:07:58.45676+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:58.719547
License: Public Domain

ON MOTION FOR REHEARING
With remarkable candor and commendable brevity, the parties submitted this case on an agreed statement of facts. In their zeal to present the controlling questions with only the pertinent facts, no information was supplied concerning the disability of the appellant. With leave of court, a further stipulation of facts has been filed for consideration with the appellant’s motion for rehearing. We now have before us the following:
“On October 1, 1966, appellant, Joseph Barnett Dominey, Jr., was eligible to receive retirement pay for voluntary retirement based on longevity of 24 years. On that date he was involuntarily retired from the Navy with disability retirement on account of a heart condition and other health problems, none of which are ascribed to any accident or other specific event.
“Upon retirement, appellant was entitled, solely at his option, to elect either to receive ordinary retirement pay with his longevity and his active-duty base pay at time of retirement being the only determining factors, or to receive disability retirement pay to be determined by a formula that multiplies the percentage of disability times the amount of his active-duty base pay at time of retirement. When the appellant computed his prospective retirement pay by each of these methods, he elected to accept disability retirement pay, because he would thereby receive more retirement pay.
“At the time of trial, appellant was receiving disability retirement pay from the United States Navy, and he has continued at all times since then to receive disability retirement pay from the Navy.”
Considering these additional facts, we adhere to our original opinion. The payments though labeled “disability,” still fit into the mould of an earned property right. They did not come to him as payment for *476damages suffered by an injury, but were a part of the bundle of benefits — pay, quarters, travel allowances, etc. — earned by service. As such, they flowed into the community.
The motion for rehearing is overruled.