GENERAL AMERICAN LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Lee CASTONGUAY; Jerry Fitzpatrick; Charles Kilmer, Et Al., Defendants-Appellants
Opinion
Opinion
Noonan, J.
This case, a sequel to General American Life Ins. Co. v. Castonguay, 984 F.2d 1518 (9th Cir.1993), is an action by a creditor of an ERISA trust against the Trustees in their representative capacity. The creditor seeks to enforce a judgment against a portion of the assets of the trust which the Trustees contend were marked by practice as “in re serve,” to be returned on termination to the employer contributors to the trust. Holding that these assets are part of the trust, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment to the creditor.
FACTS
General American Life Insurance Company (General) managed health insurance by contract with the Trustees of the Northern California Motor Car Dealers Association Trust Fund (the Trustees). The trust, as we have already determined, was an ERISA trust. General American Life, 984 F.2d at 1519 . Federal law, accordingly, governs the relationship “between plan and trustee,” id. at 1521 , and so must govern the determination of what constitutes the res of the trust.
The trust was created by 239 separate employers, auto dealers in Northern California. Each signed a subscription agreement which provided as follows: