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Same-sex partner of late YSU dean sues for death benefits
By Denise Dick
ERIE, PA.
The domestic partner of a long-time Youngstown State University dean claims breach of contract, negligence and violation of equal protection laws in a lawsuit against an insurance company that denied him life insurance benefits after his partner’s 2012 death.
Albert Celec of Boardman and the late Philip Ginnetti, who served as dean of YSU’s Beeghly College of Education for 10 years, were domestic partners from 1994 until Ginnetti’s death.
Ginnetti left YSU in 2010 to become provost and vice president for academic affairs at Edinboro University “largely because Edinboro prohibits discrimination due to sexual orientation and marital status in employment, and participating in its Management Benefits Program allowed Dr. Ginnetti to provide healthcare and other benefits” to Celec, according to the lawsuit in Erie County Common Pleas Court in Erie, Pa.
The lawsuit initially named Edinboro as a defendant as well, but the university was later dropped from the complaint.
In 1999, Ginnetti and Celec signed a shared living agreement, which required each to “maintain life insurance on the other and to name the other as beneficiary on any policy,” it said.
Edinboro granted Ginnetti’s application for recognition of Celec as his qualified domestic partner, and the couple received health care and other benefits through the university’s management benefits program.
The university provided Ginnetti with $50,000 in life insurance from Prudential and offered him the opportunity to buy supplemental life insurance. Ginnetti bought $100,000 in coverage from Cigna.
An Edinboro employee, however, didn’t fill in the name of a beneficiary on the life insurance paperwork as Ginnetti had requested.
Both insurance policies say that without a beneficiary designation, proceeds will be paid to a surviving spouse.
An associate vice president at Edinboro wrote to both insurance companies at Celec’s request to provide evidence of the two men’s partnership.
Celec also submitted claims to both insurance companies, requesting the payment.
Celec referred comment to his attorneys, John Stember and Maureen Davidson-Welling, both of Pittsburgh.
“Albert [Celec] submitted the same information to both insurance companies, and Prudential just paid him,” Stember said.
But Cigna refused to pay Celec, his attorney said.
Celec appealed Cigna’s decision, arguing that he should be treated as Ginnetti’s spouse.
“While the appeal was pending, Cigna went ahead and paid” Ginnetti’s mother, Stember said. “When there’s a dispute, insurance companies don’t typically pay anyone.”
That’s because depending on the appeal’s outcome, the company may have to pay again, he said.
In a 2013 letter to an attorney who formerly represented Celec, Cigna wrote that when no beneficiary is listed, death benefits will be paid to the first surviving class of the following relatives: spouse, children, parent, siblings and executors of the deceased’s estate.
“Mr. Celec does not meet the definition of spouse” in the policy and wasn’t a member of a surviving class, Cigna’s letter said.
The policy defines spouse as “‘lawful spouse,’ not just a ‘spouse’ as the parties may wish to hold themselves out as publicly,” the insurance company’s letter said. “The information in the file supports that at the time of his death, Dr. Philip E. Ginnetti was not married and as such he had no lawful spouse.”
At the time of Ginnetti’s death, same -sex marriage was outlawed in Ohio and Pennsylvania. It was not until a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling last June that same-sex marriage became legal nationwide.
Cigna got the shared living arrangement, spelling out that each man was required to name the other as beneficiary of his life insurance policy and the letter from the university, Stember points out.
“What other information do you need?” he said.
“That raised in our mind the possibility that there is another agenda here – maybe there’s some ... anti-gay bias,” Stember said.
Neither representatives for Cigna nor the Philadelphia attorney who represented the company could be reached last week because of the holiday.