Kimberly-Clark Must Pay Benefits to Deceased Worker’s Partner

Kimberly-Clark Corp. must follow the wishes of a deceased employee and pay the benefits in his 401(k) and profit-sharing plan to his long-time romantic partner, a federal court said.

This isn’t a hard case, Judge Gail A. Weilheimer said Monday. Instead, it’s “puzzling as to how we arrived at a point where the judicial power of the United States is required to resolve it,” Weilheimer said in an opinion for the US District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Bill Teetsel worked for Kimberly-Clark and lived with Sophie Kostomite for 20 years. Though they lived together and she referred ...