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State says woman in Topeka sperm donor case deceived agency in child support claim

Marotta's attorney dismisses state's claims that contract may be invalid

Posted: January 3, 2013 

 

By Sherman Smith

THE CAPITAL-JOURNAL

 

The state agency seeking child support payments from a Topeka man who donated sperm to a lesbian couple says one of the women “clearly deceived” the department.

 

The Kansas Department for Children and Families in a court filing Wednesday also called into question the validity of a sperm donor contract between William Marotta and the couple, Jennifer Schreiner and Angela Bauer.

Marotta’s attorney called the agency’s filing “offensive.” Phone calls placed to the women Thursday afternoon weren’t immediately returned.

 

The state is seeking to have Marotta declared the child’s father so he can be held responsible for about $6,000 in public assistance the state provided, as well as future child support. The agency made several documents available in filing its opposition Wednesday to a motion by attorneys for Marotta to dismiss the state’s case.

 

The documents show Schreiner indicated she didn’t know the name of the donor or “have any information” about him in her application for child support. But a sperm donor contract between Marotta and the couple includes his name, and the agency noted the couple talked about their appreciation for him in an interview with The Topeka Capital-Journal.

 

The agency also says it received different versions of the donor contract from Marotta and Schreiner. One copy doesn’t include dates or Schreiner’s signature, suggesting the contract “may be invalid on its face,” the filing says.

 

Benoit Swinnen, one of Marotta’s attorneys, said Thursday he disputes the agency’s claims.

 

“We stand by that contract,” Swinnen said. “The insinuation is offensive, and we are responding vigorously to that. We stand by our story. There was no personal relationship whatsoever between my client and the mother, or the partner of the mother, or the child. Anything the state insinuates is vilifying my client, and I will address it.”

 

Wednesday’s filing by the DCF argues the sperm donor contract overlooks “the well-established law in this state that a person cannot contract away his or her obligations to support their child.” The right for support belongs to the child, the filing says, not the parents.

 

Additionally, the filing says, protection from a paternity determination is available only when the semen is provided to a licensed physician. In documents included with the filing, Schreiner wrote Marotta “donated sperm 3 times” and she “used a syringe to inseminate.”

 

The document says they “never had ‘actual sex.’ ”

 

On an application for child support dated Jan. 5, 2012, Schreiner entered question marks for the father’s name. Where the application asks, “Who do you think is the father and why,” she wrote, “no idea — sperm donor.”

In a sworn statement on the same date, she wrote: “My ex-partner and I wanted to have a baby. We were a gay couple so we had a sperm donor. We looked through donor profiles and chose one that we liked that had my partner’s same (characteristics).”

 

She added, “We do not have any information on (the child’s) sperm donor besides basic health history.”

The DCF filing says Schreiner on Sept. 11 provided to her caseworker a copy of the sperm donor contract, which states the names of all parties involved.

 

“These applications are very troubling,” the filing says, “because (Schreiner) clearly deceived DCF on her first application. She knew the name of the respondent because of the purported ‘sperm donor contract.’ However, she lied on her application and in a sworn statement by stating she did not and by implying that she used a sperm bank.”

 

The filing also says it is “implausible to think” Marotta didn’t know a licensed physician wasn’t performing the procedure when he personally delivered sperm to the couple’s house, “rather than at a doctor’s office or clinic, on three separate occasions.”

 

Swinnen said the DCF’s filing didn’t address what he identified as flaws in its original petition in the case.

“We still don’t know on what basis they’re moving, which presumption of paternity they’re pursuing,” he said. “They have not asked for DNA testing in their petition, and their new filing is the same quality as their first petition — incomplete and inconsistent.”

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