couple sues fertility clinic

Canada
March 22, 2007 10:49pm CST
Couple sues fertility clinic over 'darker' baby Updated Thu. Mar. 22 2007 2:06 PM ET Associated Press NEW YORK -- A couple can proceed with a lawsuit against a fertility clinic they filed after the wife gave birth to a daughter whose skin they thought was too dark to be their child, a judge has ruled. Thomas and Nancy Andrews, of Commack, N.Y., sued New York Medical Services for Reproductive Medicine, accusing the Manhattan clinic of medical malpractice and other offenses. They claim the Park Avenue clinic used another man's sperm to inseminate Nancy Andrews' eggs. Three DNA tests -- a home kit and two professional laboratory tests -- confirmed that Thomas Andrews was not the baby's biological father, state Supreme Court Judge Sheila Abdus-Salaam quoted the couple as saying. The couple says that they have been forced to raise a child who is "not even the same race, nationality, color ... as they are," the judge said in the ruling. The lawsuit, which seeks unspecified damages, came to light Wednesday after the judge issued a decision that allows them to proceed with parts of the lawsuit while dismissing other parts. The judge quoted the couple as saying that after their daughter, Jessica, was born Oct. 19, 2004, they knew something was wrong because of her physical appearance. They say that "while we love Baby Jessica as our own, we are reminded of this terrible mistake each and every time we look at her; it is simply impossible to ignore," the judge's decision said. The judge, in her ruling made public Wednesday, dismissed the claims against Dr. Martin Keltz, who had advised the procedure and had performed the embryo implantation. She allowed the case to proceed against Dr. Reginald Puckett as owner of the clinic but threw out the case against him as an individual. In trying to have the lawsuit against Puckett dismissed, his lawyer, Martin B. Adams, told the court that Puckett "did not examine, communicate with, care for or treat plaintiffs." The judge found Carlo Acosta, the non-physician embryologist who processed the egg and sperm for creation of an embryo, also could be held liable. The couple's lawyer, Howard J. Stern, did not immediately return a telephone call for comment. Um, ok. Why wait 3 years to file a case? This makes no sense to me...
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2 responses
• United States
23 Mar 07
This is horrible to think that this would actually happen to someone. When I first started reading this, I kept waiting to hear you say that it was a joke and then I realized that it wasn't. I counld not imagine this happening to me. I know that the couple will probably love this child as their own but this could be very hard for them to deal with. I don't understand why they would wait this long unless it just took them this long to get all of the evidence together.
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• Philippines
23 Mar 07
I can't agree with you more, rosaflorence. It is a puzzle why it took the couple that long. It could be that they were hoping against hope that there is a family lineage from either side of them that could have caused it. They were fully convinced only after 3 years of having exhausted all possibilities that there exists not a chance for it to be so.
• Philippines
23 Mar 07
It is only proper that the fertility clinic can be sued if errors of this magnitude is committed. The couple paid for their services, which I gather is enormous, because they want an offspring of their own. Now, they are given one which they did not desire to have, yet they were even made to pay for it dearly. Oh, my. This is unthinkable. Why it took the couple 3 years before they did something about it, is worth exploring.
1 person likes this