Widow's pension after just two months of marriage

Social Court Berlin: couple could not obtain documents earlier
In individual cases, a widow may also be entitled to a widow's pension if the marriage with her deceased husband lasted less than a year. According to a judgment of the Social Court (SG) Berlin announced on Friday, September 29, 2017, this applies, for example, if the wedding had been planned for a long time, but the bridal couple could not obtain the necessary documents more quickly (Ref .: S 11 R 1839 / 16).

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Thus, the Social Court of a woman originating from Ukraine was right. She met her future husband in 2007. In December 2010, he was diagnosed with advanced cancer. At the end of March 2011 they both got married, only a good two months later the man died at the beginning of June 2011.

For the pension insurance, this was a clear case of a so-called care marriage, which was concluded solely for the care of one of the spouses. By law, this is presumed to be the case if the marriage lasted less than a year until the death of one of the partners.

But here the woman could refute this assumption, the social court found. Thus, the couple had long sought the deadly diagnosis of the necessary for a marriage papers. The registry office had confirmed that both had inquired much earlier, which papers are necessary for the marriage of a German with a Ukrainian.

Obtaining the papers had been particularly difficult here because it was the second marriage for both of them. The woman had to wait several months for documents from Ukraine.

In its judgment of 11 September 2017, the Social Court of Berlin was therefore convinced that the couple actually wanted to marry long before the cancer diagnosis. Therefore, the woman is entitled to the widow's pension.

Similarly, the Social Court of Berlin had already decided in 2012 in a case in which the planned wedding had to be postponed again and again, because the divorce proceedings of the man of his previous wife had been over five years (judgment of 30 May 2012, Az .: S 11 R 5359/08; JurAgentur Report dated 14 June 2012).

For civil servants and the Federal Administrative Court had decided that the presumption of a care marriage can be refuted, if the marriage was actually planned long before a serious illness, but then "for realistic reasons" provisionally postponed (judgment and JurAgentur message from January 28 2016, Az .: 2 C 21.14).

However, a care marriage can last even if it took more than a year. The Trier Administrative Court accepted this from a former professor who suffered from several serious illnesses and married a woman 30 years younger at the age of 83 (judgment of 5 July 2016, file no. 1 K 940 / 16.TR; JurAgentur- Report dated July 20, 2016). mwo / fle