§1489 Death Gratuity: Members and Employees Dying Outside the United States While Assigned to Intelligence Duties

Summary

The Secretary of Defense may pay a death gratuity to the people who depended on a Department of Defense member or employee when that person meets certain intelligence and death conditions. The person must have been assigned to a DoD intelligence unit with a hidden identity or put in a category the Secretary says did clandestine intelligence work, and must have died after October 14, 1980 from injuries (not disease) suffered outside the United States; the death must have come from hostile or terrorist action or happened while doing a risky intelligence activity. The payment must equal the person’s yearly basic pay or salary at the time of death, is treated as a gift and replaces any smaller death gratuity from other laws, and must be made under the same rules as payments under section 413 of the Foreign Service Act of 1980 (22 U.S.C. 3973).