POLICY UNPAID IN GENOCIDE ARMENIANS SUE NEW YORK LIFE OVER BENEFITS.

Byline: David Rogers Staff Writer

LA CANADA FLINTRIDGE - Setrak Cheytanian must have feared the worst.

It was 1910 and ethnic tensions were rising against Cheytanian and other Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire, now Turkey.

That year, relatives say, Cheytanian bought a 3,000-franc life insurance policy from New York Life Insurance Co.

Four years later, he gave a copy of the policy to his America-bound sister-in-law. Shortly after, Cheytanian was killed.

``Apparently, Setrak gave the insurance policy to my mother because she was coming to New York, thinking that since the policy is from New York Life, it would be safe in New York,'' said Martin Marootian, the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit that claims the insurance company never paid benefits for policy holders who died in the Armenian genocide around 1915.

``My mother's been trying to collect on this since 1923,'' said Marootian, 85, who lives with his wife in La Canada Flintridge.

Attorney Brian Kabateck, who is representing Marootian and 49 other plaintiffs, said he finds the case historically fascinating.

``They're remarkably similar to what the insurance companies were giving over Holocaust claims. You can't prove the policy holder's dead; you need to provide a death certificate, when of course generally when there's a genocide they don't hand out death certificates,'' he said.

Many such policies were sold. A 1915 letter from New York Life's James H. McIntosh to Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan said the policies amounted to more than $10 million in sales.

The company is by no means trying to duck its obligations, officials said.

``Any statement that the company has historically ignored Armenian claims is simply not true, because we have found in our archives records of benefits paid to numerous Armenian policy holders killed in 1915, even when the policies had lapsed,'' said New York Life's William Werfelman.

In the early days of World War I, nationalism was on the rise in the mostly Muslim nation, in which 2.5 million Armenians were a Christian minority.

Beginning on April 24, 1915, Armenians inside the Ottoman Empire were rounded up. Poor people and intellectuals were killed, Armenian men were used for slave labor in the Turkish army, and Armenian women and children were relocated, historians say.

``The way they relocated them was to make them walk - the women and children and the elderly - to walk through the Syrian desert. Many of them died en route,'' Marootian said. < The Turkish government does not acknowledge that genocide occurred.

Werfelman of New York Life said the company needs proof that Marootian is a rightful heir before his claim can be settled.

``We have repeatedly asked for that information,'' he said. ``That is the primary obstacle to resolving the Marootian policy matter.''

Kabateck said he was surprised at that claim.

``That's a new one. Because that's something we can actually document if they ever asked us for it,'' he said. ``I guess it just demonstrates that 85 years hasn't changed anything - it's one roadblock after another.''

Werfelman declined to say if New York Life is discussing a settlement.

The company has also challenged a Los Angeles federal court's jurisdiction over the case.

Werfelman noted the policies gave jurisdiction over disputes to courts in France and England.

``It's important to preserve our rights under the law, including jurisdictional issues,'' said Werfelman. New York Life has filed a motion to transfer the case to France or England, for which a hearing has been set for Feb. 5.

But Kabateck said SB 1915, a bill that Gov. Gray Davis signed into law last year, gives courts in California jurisdiction over insurance claims related to the Armenian Genocide. He also noted that French and English courts don't allow class-action suits.

Sam Kadorian, 95, of Van Nuys is the only genocide survivor who is a plaintiff to the suit. He vividly remembers being in the middle of a pile of boys being speared with swords and bayonets.

``I got a souvenir - the point of a sword in my right cheek,'' which left a scar he still has, Kadorian said. ``To this day yet, every time I look in the mirror, it all comes back.''

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Photo: Martin Marootian holds a life insurance policy his family has tried to collect on.

Walt Mancini/Staff Photographer