Unpublished Disposition, 917 F.2d 1307 (9th Cir. 1983)

No. 90-55444.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Before NELSON and REINHARDT, Circuit Judges, and TANNER,^**  District Judge.

MEMORANDUM^*** 

Uros Jelicic appeals the district court's summary judgment dismissal of the following claims against the Hartford Insurance Company [hereinafter "Hartford"]: breach of contract, tortious breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing, breach of fiduciary duties, tortious breach of statutory duties, fraud, infliction of emotional distress, and conspiracy to defraud.¹  The district court held that, pursuant to the Supreme Court's decision in Pilot Life Insurance Co. v. Dedeaux, 481 U.S. 41 (1987), these state law claims were preempted by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act [ERISA]. 29 U.S.C. § 1001, et. seq. We affirm.

Jelicic was employed by Archer-Spencer Engineering [hereinafter "Archer-Spencer"] as an electrical design engineer from February to November of 1981. Archer-Spencer was a member firm of the American Consulting Engineers Council Trust Fund [hereinafter "the Trust"], a group policyholder that served a number of engineering and land surveying firms. In turn, these group insurance policies were issued to the Trust by Hartford. John O. Felker Benefit Services, Inc. [hereinafter "Felker"] administered claims for the Trust, and Felker complied with ERISA requirements in providing annual IRS reports to both the Internal Revenue Service and to member firms.

Jelicic suffered a back injury in October 1981 and was paid disability benefits through March 12, 1982, when he started work at another job, and from August 27, 1982, when he left the new employer, to February 3, 1983, when a medical examination found him not totally disabled. Jelicic cites several more recent doctors' reports in arguing that he is now totally disabled. Claiming that Hartford improperly processed his claims for benefits, he brought suit in state court on the aforementioned state law causes of action. After Hartford removed the case to federal district court, Judge Gadbois found this to be a "classic Pilot Life preemption case" and granted summary judgment. Jelicic appeals.

The district court's holding that ERISA preempts state law claims was a legal conclusion, which we review de novo. Nevill v. Shell Oil Co., 835 F.2d 209, 211 (9th Cir. 1987).

In Pilot Life Insurance Co. v. Dedeaux, 481 U.S. 41 (1987), the Supreme Court held that ERISA preempts all state law causes of action that relate to an ERISA plan. In Pilot Life, the employee had begun receiving permanent disability benefits under his employer's ERISA-regulated benefit plan on the basis of a work-related injury. The employee received benefits for two years, after which the insurance company terminated and then reinstated them several times. As a result, the employee brought suit alleging claims of tortious breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, and fraud in the inducement. Id. at 43. The Court emphasized that "the express preemption provisions of ERISA are deliberately expansive, and designed to establish pension plan regulation as exclusively a federal concern." Id. at 45-46 (inner quotation marks omitted). Further, "the preemption clause is not limited to state laws specifically designed to affect employee benefit plans." Id. at 47-48 (inner quotation marks omitted). Finally, the court agreed that "Congress clearly expressed an intent that the civil enforcement provisions of ERISA Sec. 502(a) be the exclusive vehicle for actions by ERISA-plan participants and beneficiaries asserting improper processing of a claim for benefits." Id. at 52.

The Ninth Circuit has carefully followed the Supreme Court's prescription as to preemption, and we have already decided cases that presented six of Jelicic's seven causes of action. In Kanne v. Connecticut General Life Insurance Co., 867 F.2d 489 (9th Cir. 1988), we found ERISA preempted state actions for breach of contract, tortious breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing, and tortious breach of statutory duties under California Insurance Code Sec. 790.03. Davidian v. Southern California Meat Cutters Union, 859 F.2d 134 (9th Cir. 1988), found similar preemption of a claim for breach of fiduciary duty, and Johnson v. District 2 Marine Engineers Beneficial Ass'n, 857 F.2d 514 (9th Cir. 1988), held that ERISA preempted fraud and the infliction of emotional distress claims. Though we have no case authority to cite for the proposition that ERISA also preempts a claim for conspiracy to defraud, we think that the other cases would readily support it, since such a claim is merely one more state cause of action, indistinguishable from the other six.

There is no doubt here that Jelicic's was an ERISA plan, and it is also certain that Jelicic's claims relate to such a plan. As a result, we must affirm the district court because we agree with Judge Gadbois that this is, indeed, a classic ERISA preemption case.

AFFIRMED.