Child support remains a significant area of interest for family law practitioners in the domestic and international arenas, and recent developments have highlighted the need for a focus on this topic. In this column, we report on two interesting cases from Kansas as well as the United States’ adoption of The Hague Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support.
Almost all media outlets have reported the story from Kansas in which a sperm donor is now being asked to support the child conceived as a result of the donation. In this case the father answered an ad on Craigslist asking for sperm donation for a lesbian couple who wished to have a child. He and his wife met with the women and decided to donate the sperm. Rather than use a medical practitioner, the women used the sperm to inseminate the mother at home. This is becoming an increasingly popular practice primarily for financial reasons. The women and the sperm donor entered into a written agreement that he would not be financially responsible for the child.
