What if Plaintiff Dies After Judgement?
By Robert A. Clifford Special provisions are made for the death of the plaintiff after judgment. First, if there has been entered a periodic judgment of a term of years, the payments continue despite the death of the plaintiff. If, on the other hand the judgment is for the remainder of the plaintiff’s life, the payments are to continue as long as he continues to live. But if he dies before the end of his actuarially determined life expectancy, then the payments continue for that number of years. Should a plaintiff die while entitled to additional payments under the judgment, those payments appear not to be part of his estate nor subject to testamentary disposition, but pass, in equitable shares, to his “qualifying survivors.” The act defines a qualifying survivor as one who would have had standing as a beneficiary has the plaintiff died, rather than been injured, in the occurrence which gave rise to the judgment. There is a variation on this concept if the judgment arose from a wrongfu
