Category: Parental Responsibility Law - Page 3

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20
Feb
2025

Judicial Warning & Naming 0f Serial Sperm Donor ‘Who Fathered 180 Children’

In a recently published family law case In the Matter of D [2023] EWFC 333, His Honour Judge Jonathan Furness KC took the unusual step to publicly name a serial sperm donor and warn the public and vulnerable women seeking to get pregnant of the dangers of unregulated private sperm donation. This followed a highly contested 2-year legal battle, described as a 'nightmare' and 'horror story', between a female same-sex couple and a prolific sperm donor who applied to court to be named on the child's birth certificate, obtain parental responsibility and contact with the child.

11
Feb
2025

Genetic Testing: A Non-Biological Father, Mistaken Birth Registration & Parental Responsibility Void Ab Initio

The recent case of KL v BA [2025] EWHC 102 (Fam) brings into focus the complex legal issues that arose when genetic testing showed that a non-biological father was registered in error on a child's birth certificate. The central issue in the case was whether the effect of a declaration of non-parentage in respect of the non-biological father who had mistakenly been registered as the child's father rendered his acquisition of parental responsibility void ab initio (never having had any legal effect) or whether this could only be removed by court order.

07
Jun
2022

Sperm Donor Dispute: Parental Responsibility, Child Arrangements Orders and Fragile X Syndrome

The recent sperm donor dispute case of MacDougall v SW & Ors (sperm donor: parental responsibility or contact) (24 May 2022) highlights the problems that can arise following privately arranged sperm donation in the absence of specialist legal advice and clear expertly drafted bespoke known donor agreements. The case concerned four children whose biological father, James MacDougall, acted as a private sperm donor to women who were all (or had been) in lesbian relationships. Legal disputes arose because Mr MacDougall sought parental responsibility and child arrangements orders in respect of the children against the wishes of their mothers in three linked cases. Unusually, the Judge decided to name Mr MacDougall on public interest grounds, ruling that the public benefit in naming him outweighed the risk of identification of the children.

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