Hamlin v. Public Employees Retirement Board

Petitioner Karen Hamlin is a public employee with a retirement account in the Public Employees Retirement System (PERS). When petitioner and her ex-husband divorced, the dissolution court ordered petitioner’s PERS account divided between petitioner and her husband. However, neither petitioner nor her ex-husband ever gave PERS the paperwork it required in order to divide the account, so PERS did not divide it until after the ex-husband’s death, when his estate provided the paperwork. After dividing the account, PERS distributed the account’s balance attributable to the ex-husband’s share to…