The U.S. Supreme Court decided Monday not to rule on a case brought by Life Partners, a Waco, Texas, provider, on whether states can regulate life settlements.
Life Partners had hoped the top court would resolve conflicting opinions on the matter in two federal circuit courts.
Life Partners had appealed a U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals case in Richmond, Va., that went against the company on April 30. It upheld a lower court that said viaticals are to be considered part of the insurance business and thus can be regulated by states.
A 1996 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., ruled that Life Partners transactions did not constitute the business of insurance.
The Virginia case involved a viatical policy sold by a terminally ill woman who had invoked the state’s minimum pricing provision. Life Partners had paid her $29,000 for her $115,000 policy. But she later learned that she would have been entitled to at least $69,000 under the state’s pricing policy.
