Sperm donor didn't have touted degrees and 'impressive health history,' suit says
A Canadian couple who learned the identity of sperm Donor 9623 in a batch of emails from an Atlanta sperm bank did some sleuthing and found he was not as described, a lawsuit alleges.
Angela Collins and Margaret Elizabeth Hanson, who have a 7-year-old son conceived with the donor’s sperm, sued the sperm bank’s parent company, Xytex Corp., in a suit filed March 31 in Atlanta, report the Associated Press, the Toronto Star and the Canadian Press. Also named as defendants are sperm bank staffers and the donor himself.
According to the suit, staffers from the sperm bank said donor 9623 was pursuing a Ph.D. in neuroscience engineering and had an “impressive health history.” In reality, the suit says, donor 9623 had schizophrenia, was a college dropout and had once been arrested for burglary.
The suit also claims that a photo of Donor 9623 had been altered to remove a large mole on his cheek. It also alleges fraud, misrepresentation, negligence and battery. The couple from Ontario, Canada, is seeking money for medical monitoring of children conceived with the donor’s sperm, along with other compensation.
Xytex president Kevin O’Brien said in an open letter posted online that the donor had a medical exam, provided copies of bachelor’s and master’s degrees and maintained he had no physical or medical impairments. The couple was informed that personal information provided by the donor had not been verified, O’Brien said.
The couple’s San Francisco lawyer, Nancy Hersh, countered that staffers didn’t couch their information about the donor in terms of “this is what he told us.” “They represented him, both orally and in their donor literature, to be the best of the best,” Hersh told AP.
