Sperm Donor fights for right to be a Dad in California

The actor Jason Patric wants to be a Dad. The mother of his biological child, 3-year-old Gus, wants him to just be a sperm donor. Who wins? If I taught family law, I’d make this case my last class of the semester, because it’s right at the edge of a frontier of parenthood that courts and states haven’t settled yet. It also scrambles the usual assumptions. Traditionally, it is fathers who have run from parental responsibilities and mothers who have tried to hold them accountable, often to win child support. I’m not talking about most fathers, of course, just the ones who essentially say they got tricked—they just gave sperm, or they just had sex, and didn’t intend to become fathers at all. In this case, Patric wants a relationship with his biological son, and it’s Gus’ mother, Danielle Schreiber, who is asking the courts to turn him away. It’s a different entry point into an old fight. But Schreiber’s stance shouldn’t change the underlying rule: Unless both biological parents agree before birth that the father has no rights at all, courts should presume that he is indeed the father, not just some guy who ejaculated into a cup. Patric and his ex-girlfriend, Schreiber, conceived Gus via in vitro fertilization. Patric says he spent time with Gus after the boy was born, until Schreiber cut him out. He has pictures to prove it. “I want my son back,” he told Katie Couric. He says he was there from the start and signed a document stating that he was Gus’ “intended parent.” Schreiber say that Gus was conceived after she and Patric broke up, and that neither of them intended him to be the boy’s father. “It's not about him having a relationship or contact with Gus. This is just about rights,” she said, also on TV. “Me preserving my right to be a sole legal parent, not having to share that with someone who has never intended to and never raised Gus.” So far, Patric is losing. A California court ruled that he has no parental rights. The judge interpreted state law to provide that if a man isn’t married to the mother of his biological child, and gives her his sperm, then the general rule is that he has no paternity rights. It doesn’t matter whether he spent time with the baby afterward—or what might be best for the child. If you think about it, that’s pretty shocking. Usually, family law presumes that two parents are better than one, University of Florida law professor Lee-Ford Tritt pointed out when I called him to talk about this case. That way, a child has two sources of love and income. The two-parent rule doesn’t apply to anonymous sperm donors—no one would donate if it did. Also, if the sperm donor is someone the mother knows, the parents should be able to contract away his parental rights if that’s what they want. Otherwise, it will be harder for women to go to men they know for sperm, and that’s not a good outcome. Sometimes children are better off knowing who their fathers are, even if the fathers aren’t legally responsible for them. The law should allow for different kinds of donors and family constellations. But if there’s no clear agreement between the parents, then the law should go back to presuming that the genetic father should be treated as the real father. The judge who ruled against Patric did the opposite. He’s saying, in effect, that Schreiber gets to decide to bar Patric from any kind of parental involvement. We’re not talking about whether Patric gets to raise Gus—that’s a separate custody issue—just about whether he has any leg to stand on in court proceedings about Gus at all. Why should this decision about Gus’ parenthood be up to his mother alone, without any consideration of how Patric behaved toward Gus, and whether Gus would be better off with Patric in his life? Courts should, and often do, ask a different question: Has the father “held out” a child as his own? That’s the legal term of art for a test that looks at the father’s relationship to the child. Did Patric spend time with Gus or pay for any of his care? Did he acknowledge him as his son? “Holding out a child as one’s own is huge in the courts for determining parental rights,” Tritt says. That’s not how current California law works, however. It provides that a sperm donor, to a bank or for IVF involving a woman other than his wife, “is treated in law as if he were not the natural father of a child thereby conceived, unless otherwise agreed to in a writing signed by the donor and the woman prior to the conception of the child.” Article: 14th August 2013 www.slate.com

Millionaire sperm donor in Australia fights for custody of child

A MILLIONAIRE businessman who secretly helped a single friend conceive through IVF has launched a legal fight over custody. In a case that could have ramifications for hundreds of donor conceptions, the man wants the Family Court to rule on whether he is the boy's parent.
Under Victorian law, a man who donates sperm is not considered the father of any resulting children. All donors must sign consent forms agreeing they do not have any legal rights or responsibilities towards offspring.

At a hearing, Family Court senior registrar John FitzGibbon noted the case centred on whether the relationship between the pair was "friend", or "friend but with other things agreed".

The woman's lawyer told the court she had always intended to bring up the child as a single mum. "We don't accept as a matter of law that he is a parent," her barrister Andrew Robinson said. "Just because he donated genetic material doesn't make him a parent."

The man had kept his part secret, the court heard. On the occasions he visited the child, it was usually at the mother's home. He is seeking regular access visits and, ultimately, joint custody and parental responsibility.

The man's lawyer told court his client had an "arrangement" with the woman before she began IVF. Barrister Tim North, SC, told the court the man attended the birth, and had covered the costs.

The court heard he'd seen his son as often as three times a week since birth, but contact had ceased about Christmas. Mr North claimed his client was concerned his developing relationship with the child would be adversely affected the longer he was prevented from seeing him.

The woman's lawyer described her relationship to the man as "like a family friend". But the lawyer described her relationship with the man's family as "acrimonious", and alleged the man's sister had made threats to kill in text messages.

Mr Robinson told the court other parties - including IVF providers and possibly the State Government - would potentially join the case, given possible ramifications of the apparent conflict between state and Commonwealth law. Senior Registrar FitzGibbon noted the case had the potential "to grow like Topsy". He referred to the parties as "mother" and "father" during the initial hearing, though he acknowledged there was dispute over whether those terms were correct.