Re S (Deceased)
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 1996 |
| Date | 1996 |
| Court | Chancery Division |
RATTEE, J
Public policy – husband and wife took out joint endowment policy – husband killed wife – wife predeceased policy maturity date – husband not entitled to benefit of policy by operation of the forfeiture rule – husband applying for order that the proceeds of the policy should be held on trust for the benefit of their child – true construction of joint endowment policy – whether court would make the order.
The plaintiff was a man who suffered attacks of depression amounting to mental illness. He married his wife in 1985. They had a son, who was born in 1988. In 1993 the husband was told that the wife was having an affair with another man. In an attempt to secure a confession the plaintiff resorted to vicious violence against the wife, as a result of which she died. The plaintiff was charged with murder, but pleaded guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility. In July 1994 the plaintiff was made the subject of a hospital order and a restriction order under the Mental Health Act 1983. The plaintiff was still in hospital.
In 1991 the plaintiff had taken out a policy of life assurance ("the policy") on the lives of himself and his wife. It provided that the basic sum assured should be payable on the death of the first to die of the lives assured or on the earlier occurrence of the maturity date. It had been conceded that the deliberate nature of the attack on his wife disentitled the plaintiff from any benefit that he would otherwise take on her death. However, the plaintiff applied, through his brother and next friend, for an order that the proceeds of the policy be made available to be put in trust for his son contingent upon him attaining full age.
No other person was interested in the policy, and the insurance company had indicated that they would abide by the decision of the court.
Held – The forfeiture rule ("the rule") was the rule of public policy which precluded a person who had unlawfully killed another from acquiring a benefit in consequence of the killing. The Forfeiture Act 1982 gave the court power to modify the effect of that rule where it was satisfied that the justice of the case so required. In particular, the court could modify the effect of the rule where an offender had been precluded by it from acquiring any interest in certain property, being property which, before the death of the deceased, was held on trust for any person. Section 11 of the Married Women's Property Act 1882 ("the 1882 Act") provided that a policy of assurance effected by a spouse on his or her life and expressed to be for the benefit of the other spouse and/or children or any of them created a trust in favour of the objects therein named and the moneys payable on any such
trust did not form part of the insured's estate so long as any object of the trust remained unperformed. On its face that did not apply to a joint endowment policy. However, it had been held that such a policy should be treated as two separate policies effected by each spouse for the benefit of the other, each policy falling within s 11 of the 1882 Act. The question then arose as to whether the fact that, in this case, the life assured was herself a possible beneficiary took the notional policy outside s 11 of the 1882 Act, which required any policy to be exclusively for the benefit of the other spouse and/or children. It appeared, however, that the true view of the joint policy was as two separate policies, one of which was by the wife for the executive benefit of the husband in the event that she predeceased the maturity date. The policy created a valid trust for the husband in that event under s 11 of the 1882 Act. The trust for the husband had existed from the inception of the policy, and therefore from before the wife's death. It followed, therefore, that the husband's interest under the trust arising under the 1882 Act did fall within the ambit of the Forfeiture Act 1982. The court would therefore accede to the plaintiff's request. It had been accepted that his responsibility for his act had been substantially impaired by reason of abnormality of mind. The order sought would benefit the plaintiff's son not himself. No one else was interested in the policy. The court was satisfied that the justice of the case required the effect of the forfeiture rule to be modified in this instance.
Statutory provisions referred to:Forfeiture Act 1982, ss 1(1) and 2.
Homicide Act 1957, s 2.
Married Women's Property Act 1882, s 11.
Mental Health Act 1983, ss 37 and 41.
Cases referred to in judgment:Griffiths v Fleming [1909] 1 KB 804.
H (Deceased), Re [1990] 1 FLR 44.
Ioakimidis' Policy Trusts, Re [1925] Ch 403.
K (Deceased), Re [1985] Ch 85.
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