Davis v. Boston Mutual Life Insurance Co.

“Decisions of this court have established the proposition that public policy forbids even an innocent beneficiary of a policy of life insurance to recover on the policy where the death of the insured is the result of his own criminal conduct.” Molloy v. John Hancock Mut. Life Ins. Co., 327 Mass. 181,182 (1951). In deference to the weight of modem authority in other jurisdictions, we now disestablish that proposition. The result is that the plaintiff recovers the ordinary benefit under a straight life insurance policy, but, by reason of an exclusion clause in the policy, does not recover…