United States Court of Appeals For the Eighth Circuit ___________________________ No. 17-1895 ___________________________ Mary G. Yang lllllllllllllllllllllPlaintiff - Appellee v. Farmers New World Life Insurance Company lllllllllllllllllllllDefendant - Appellant ____________ Appeal from United States District Court for the District of Minnesota - Minneapolis ____________ Submitted: June 14, 2018 Filed: August 3, 2018 ____________ Before WOLLMAN, ARNOLD, and KELLY, Circuit Judges. ____________ ARNOLD, Circuit Judge. In May, 2003, Minnesota resident May Yang applied to Farmers New World Life Insurance Company for a life-insurance policy it sold only to people under age sixty. In her application, Yang said she was born on July 11, 1943, and was thus fifty- nine years old, providing a Laotian birth certificate as proof. Farmers issued her the policy later that month under a contract containing the two provisions at issue in this appeal. One provision states that Farmers "will not contest this policy after it has been in force for two years . . . except for nonpayment of premiums." The other provides that "[i]f the insured's age or sex was misstated, the amount payable will be that which the premiums paid would have purchased at the correct age or sex." In 2014, Mary Yang ("Mary," to avoid confusion with the insured) filed a claim with Farmers for the policy's $150,000 death benefit, asserting that she was Yang's beneficiary and submitting as proof of Yang's demise a Laotian death certificate that, like the birth certificate, stated that Yang was born in July, 1943. But when Farmers verified Yang's social-security number, it learned the Social Security Administration had a much earlier birth date for her (May 27, 1933), which would have made her almost seventy years old when she applied for the policy and thus ineligible for it. Invoking the policy's misstatement-of-age clause, Farmers refused to award Mary the death benefit, but instead refunded Yang's premiums with interest. Mary sued Farmers in Minnesota state court, claiming that Farmers violated its contract with Yang when it declined to award Mary the death benefit. She alleged that Yang gave Farmers her real birth date in applying for the policy and, if she did not, Farmers could not "rescind" the policy due to her misstatement of age. After Farmers removed the case to federal district court, both parties moved for summary judgment. In her motion, Mary argued that Yang was erroneously assigned May 27, 1933, as her birth date when she immigrated to the United States and that her birth date was actually July 11, 1943. In its cross-motion, Farmers argued Yang's birth date was May 27, 1933, since that date appears not only on all of her federal and state identification documents (including her passport, certificate of naturalization, and Minnesota ID), but also on her application to a different life-insurance company for a different policy. Farmers also questioned the authenticity and reliability of the Laotian documents that stated that Yang was born in 1943: When the beneficiary of her other policy applied for its benefit, she submitted a different ...
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