NJ Supreme Court Decision Could Change Existing Surrogate Contracts
By David Madden
CHERRY HILL, N.J. (CBS) - A decision from the New Jersey Supreme Court leaves in place what many suggest is a pattern that discriminates against women who use surrogates to have a family.
The justices in Trenton split 3-3, therefore, upholding an appellate court ruling in the case of a Camden County couple. The wife allowed her husband's sperm to impregnate a surrogate. So who has the legal parental right? The surrogate.
"If the mother who entered into the surrogacy agreement wants to be the legal mother of the child," Cherry Hill family law attorney Richard Klein said. "She has to move to adopt the child," which is what the Camden County couple will do.
If the husband is infertile and his wife is artificially inseminated with his permission, he's recognized as the father.
Klein doesn't see this case as the last word on the issue and believes many surrogate contracts could now be called into question.
