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used to purchase the assets. In that event, the estate alleges
that such claim, in the amount of one-half of the cash surrender
value of the policies at the date of Mrs. Burris’s death, should
be allowed as a debt against decedent’s estate.
Conversely, respondent alleges that the general rules of
Louisiana community property law are inapplicable to the policies
at issue in this case. Rather, respondent contends that
Louisiana jurisprudence, particularly as interpreted by the Court
of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Catalano v. United States,
429 F.2d 1058 (5th Cir. 1969), has established a separate body of
law governing life insurance policies. Moreover, in respondent’s
view, this body of law stands for the principle that ownership of
life insurance policies in Louisiana is determined by the terms
of the contract of insurance itself. Hence, since the contracts
here expressly placed all incidents of ownership in decedent,
respondent avers that the policies were decedent’s separate
property and that the full value of the proceeds therefrom is
includable in his gross estate.
Additionally, in response to the estate’s alternative
argument, respondent maintains that the heirs have no
reimbursement claim against his estate because any such claim was
extinguished upon the death of the insured, because Mrs. Burris’s
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