British Sperm-Donor Must Pay Child Support After Lesbian Parents Split

A British firefighter who donated sperm to a lesbian couple whose relationship subsequently ended has been required to pay child support. He claims he was assured at the time he agreed to assist the couple that he would have no financial responsibility for the child.

Times Online reports:

Mr Bathie was approached by the couple five years ago after they entered a civil partnership. At the time he was in a relationship with a woman who had been sterilised and was not planning to have children. He has since married someone else.

Unaware of the legal pitfalls, he was shocked when the Child Support Agency contacted him last November to demand payments because the women had split up. He was made to take a £400 paternity test and his pay was docked.

A spokesman for the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority said that men who donated sperm through licensed fertility clinics were not the legal fathers of any children born as a result. “Men giving out their sperm in any other way, such as via internet arrangements, are legally the father of any children born, with all the responsibilities that carries,” he added.

The CSA said that, unless a child was legally adopted, both biological parents were financially responsible. “The Child Support Agency legislation is not gender or partnership based,” a spokesman said. “Only anonymous sperm donors at licensed centres are exempt from being treated as the legal father. This does not apply to men who donate sperm as part of a personal arrangement.”

UPDATE: December 5, 2007 - Mother says "sperm donor's" story untrue, claims he participated actively in child's life.

Ms Arnold had two children by Mr Bathie – a girl, aged 2, and a boy, 4, who is disabled. She said that the initial arrangement was for him to be a donor only. “I will openly admit to that, but it was him that changed his mind. He wanted to be involved, he wanted to be a dad. Who was I to stop him? I believed it would be beneficial for my children to have their father involved.”

Far from never seeing his daughter, the fireman, from Enfield, North London, was in regular contact and looked after her one weekend every month, Ms Arnold said. “Every time she needed something he was there. He paid for things, he helped me out.”

See: Sperm donor played the role of full-time father, insists lesbian mother.

- Garry J. Wise, Toronto

Visit our Toronto Law Firm website: www.wiselaw.net

EMPLOYMENT LAW • CIVIL LITIGATION • WILLS AND ESTATES • FAMILY LAW & DIVORCE

Kansas Sperm Donor Denied Parental Rights

This outcome would be highly unlikely in an Ontario court.

Topeka Capital Journal reports on a contoversial decision of the Kansas Supreme Court:

The Kansas Supreme Court ruled Friday that a sperm donor who wants to have parental rights with any subsequent children must have a written agreement with the mother.

The 4-2 decision upholding constitutionality of Kansas' current donor law was the first of its kind in the nation.

The ruling was the offspring of lawsuits involving Samantha Harrington, who conceived twins with sperm donated by Daryl Hendrix. The mother and the donor, both of Topeka, disagreed on whether they had entered into an oral agreement giving parental rights to the donor. They also disagreed on whether certain documents constituted a written agreement.

Court testimony shows Harrington, 34, a lawyer, had solicited Hendrix to donate sperm.

Hendrix, a Josten's employee, Reece & Nichols Homes marketing director and home decorator, said they orally agreed to co-parent the children together.

Based on this news report, it seems clear that the Court came to its decision only reluctantly:

...[Justice Carole A]. Beier authored the opinion for the majority, holding the law's requirement of a written agreement constitutional under both state and federal due process and equal protection provisions.

"All that is constitutional is not necessarily wise," she wrote. "We are mindful of, and moved by, advocacy for public policy to maximize the chance of the availability of two parents — and two parents' resources — to Kansas children. We are also aware of continued evolution in regulation of artificial insemination in this and other countries.

However, weighing of the interests of all involved in these procedures, as well as the public policies that are furthered by favoring one or another in certain circumstances, is the charge of the Kansas Legislature, not of this court."

McFarland said the provision requiring written agreement "appears to be aimed at protecting both parties from unwanted duties and/or obligations being imposed without their consent in the very limited factual situation to which it applies."

In dissent, Caplinger said she would have found the law unconstitutional because the donor had a fundamental right to parent and the law's requirement of a written agreement resulted in a passive waiver of that right.

"Therein lies the constitutional problem," she said. "Fundamental rights must be actively waived, rather than passively lost to inaction."

(via ABA Journal)

- Garry J. Wise, Toronto

Visit our Toronto Law Firm website: www.wiselaw.net

EMPLOYMENT LAW • CIVIL LITIGATION • WILLS AND ESTATES • FAMILY LAW & DIVORCE