A state appeals panel has determined the minor child of a police officer who died at work is not entitled to the entirety of his father’s survivor’s benefit, saying the specific benefit is available only to surviving spouses.
Glenview Police Officer Owen Masterton died in the office on Dec. 6, 2014, after suffering a heart attack at pre-shift roll call meeting. According to court documents, the 19-year veteran was divorced, though he and his ex-wife, Kelly Masterton, had a 10-year-old son. In June 2015 the Glenview Police Pension Board started interim payments to the boy — 50% of Masterton’s salary — backdated to February and with no prejudice to decisions about whether the death was within the line of duty.
Two years later, Kelly Masterson, as guardian of her son’s estate, asked the pension board for a hearing to request an act of duty survivor death benefit of 100% of the officer’s salary. The village of Glenview then moved to intervene and moved to dismiss the application.
Illinois First District Appellate Justice Bertina E. Lampkin
| illinoiscourts.gov
The board dismissed Masterton’s request for lack of jurisdiction in February 2018, as the minor son was not a surviving spouse, and awarded the child the 50% minor children’s survivor benefit until his 18th birthday. Masterton sought administrative review of that decision, and after a March 2019 remand the board determined in November 2020 the death didn’t result from police work and the son therefore wasn’t entitled to the 100% benefit.
Masterton again sought administrative review, where Cook County Circuit Court Judge David Atkins affirmed the pension board’s decision in February 2022. She challenged that finding before the Illinois First District Appellate Court. Justice Bertina Lampkin wrote the panel’s opinion, issued Dec. 15; Justices Thomas Hoffman and Mary Rochford concurred.
On appeal, Masterton argued an officer’s attendance at a roll call meeting constitutes an act of duty under the Illinois Pension Code and said the pension board abused its discretion by requiring her to provide a further connection between an officer’s job and death. The village argued act of duty survivor benefits can only go to surviving spouses and that the pension board lacked jurisdiction to reopen its initial decision.
The panel rejected the village’s argument about the pension board’s jurisdiction, saying the interim payments did not represent a definitive action that would’ve started the clock on Kelly Masterton’s appeal window.
Turning to interpretation of the Pension Code, Lampkin explained there is a subsection establishing a survivor sequence — surviving spouse, minor or dependent children of an unmarried officer and then an officer’s dependent parents — but one clause in that subsection clearly stating “it is applicable only to the deceased officer’s surviving spouse.”
That clause covers pensions for spouses of officers who died on or after Jan. 1, 2001, without having started to collect a retirement or disability pension, “and as a result of sickness, accident or injury incurred in or resulting from the performance of an act of duty.”
Because that specific clause has no reference to the survivor sequence, Lampkin wrote, the panel reasoned “the legislature intended that only a surviving spouse could benefit from the duty-related survivorship pension under that subsection.”
Since Masterton’s son isn’t a surviving spouse, Lampkin continued, he can’t apply for benefits under that section. Since the panel reached that conclusion, it didn’t need to address Masterton’s challenge to the pension board’s determination that participation in roll call isn’t an act of duty, her allegations the board misapplied pension framework and the burden it placed on her to link the heart attack to police work.
The panel reversed the March 2019 circuit court ruling that undid the pension board’s February 2018 dismissal of Masterton’s application for act of duty benefits and entered judgment affirming the pension board’s decision. It furthermore vacated the pension board’s November 2020 decision and the February 2022 circuit court affirmation of that decision.
Masterton was represented in the case by attorney David M. Stepanich, of Gurnee.
Glenview and the police pension board were represented by attorneys Richard J. Reimer, of Reimer Dobrovolny & LaBardi, of Hinsdale, and Paul A. Denham and James J. Powers, of Clark Baird Smith, of Rosemont.