Cal. GOV § 9359.9

This is the official text of Cal. GOV § 9359.9, part of California’s Government Code — covers the structure and operation of state and local government, including public employment and public records.

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Official statutory text

(a) If a beneficiary is not designated, or if the estate is the beneficiary and the estate would not be probated if no amount were due from this system, all of the amount due by reason of the death of a member or retired member, including retirement allowances accrued but not received prior to death, shall be paid directly without probate to the surviving next of kin of the deceased, or the guardians of such survivors’ estates, share and share alike.

(b) Such payment shall be made in the same order in which the following groups are listed:

(1) Spouse.

(2) Children.

(3) Father and mother.

(4) Grandchildren.

(5) Brothers and sisters.

(6) Nieces and nephews.

Status: in_force · Read it on the official government site

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About this page: Statute text is reproduced from official government publishers via the Open US Law dataset (Vaquill AI, snapshot v2026.08, CC BY 4.0). Primary legislative text like this is public domain under the government-edicts doctrine (Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, 2020). We link every section back to its official source so you can verify it independently.