CALIFORNIA COURT DENIES ARMENIANS RIGHT TO OTTOMAN LIFE INSURANCE POLICIES

2009/0 8/21 | 13:12

Diaspora

Yesterday’s Associated Press reported that a California court has
overturned a law that would have allowed descendants of Armenian
Genocide survivors to seek compensation for life insurance policies
issued by German insurance companies to Armenians in the Ottoman
Empire. Here’s the article.

A federal appeals court invalidated a California law Thursday that
allowed heirs of Armenians killed in the Turkish Ottoman Empire
nearly a century ago to seek payment on the life insurance policies
of dead relatives.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the law amounted to
unconstitutional meddling in U.S. foreign policy.

It based its 2-1 ruling on a 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision that
struck down another California law designed to help Holocaust survivors
collect on Nazi-era insurance policies.

The federal government does not recognize the mass killings of
Armenians during World War I as genocide, but the California
Legislature did in 2000 when it enacted the disputed law.

About half of the people of Armenian descent living in this country
reside in California.

Lawyer Brian Kabateck, who represents Armenian-American heirs, plans
to appeal.

"The ruling is wrong. It’s a disaster," Kabateck said. "The one million
Armenians that live in California today have been told by the court
that even the use of the word ‘genocide’ by a government is illegal."

If the ruling is not set aside, it would prevent Armenian heirs from
claiming inheritances and prohibit California and other states from
marking the anniversary of the onset of the ethnic bloodshed that
claimed the lives of up to 1.5 million Armenians between 1915 and
1919 in what is now eastern Turkey, Kabateck said.

He alleges European banks and insurers illegally retained assets
valued in 1915 at about $15 million, a sum worth substantially more
at today’s value.

The California Legislature passed the law giving heirs of Armenians
who died or fled to avoid persecution until the end of next year to
file claims for old bank accounts and life insurance policies.

Class-action lawsuits brought by Armenian descendants in California
and other states led to a $20 million settlement with New York Life
Insurance Co. in 2005 and a $17 million settlement the same year with
French life insurer AXA.

William Werfelman, a spokesman for New York Life, said the company
had no intention of trying to get back any of the money it paid out
under the 2005 settlement.

"By acting honorably, and in keeping with our company values of
humanity and integrity, New York Life made many friends in the Armenian
community and we cherish these friends," Werfelman said.

Thursday’s ruling reversed a lower court judge who refused to dismiss
another class-action suit against the German life insurance companies.

Turkey long has denied the loss of so many Armenian lives constituted
genocide and instead describes the deaths as resulting from civil
unrest that accompanied the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.

The appeals court agreed with the German companies that California’s
policy improperly conflicted with the federal government’s foreign
policy aims.

Neil Soltman, the lawyer who represented the German insurance companies
that prevailed in the case, said his clients had stood to lose in
payouts to Armenian-Americans in California. Soltman said it was not
clear the companies ever sold life insurance policies to victims of
the Ottoman Empire violence.

"We are very pleased with the decision. We think it is entirely
consistent with recent Supreme Court cases and 9th Circuit cases
which have held that California and other states should not be passing
legislation that deals with questions of foreign affairs," he said.

The court recounted successful efforts by former presidents Bill
Clinton and George W. Bush to defeat congressional legislation that
would have recognized an Armenian genocide.

U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Pasadena, who as a state assemblyman co-wrote
the law that was overturned by the 9th Circuit, was perplexed by the
court’s reasoning.

"You have a group of people that has a government that hasn’t had
the will to recognize the genocide and as a result of that failing,
are being told they don’t have valid insurance claims," he said.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress