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A woman must abide by an agreement with her ex-husband to destroy five frozen embryos if they got a divorce, despite her contention that they represent her last chance to have children, a California judge ruled.
San Francisco Superior Court Judge Anne-Christine Massullo said in a tentative decision that the agreement trumps the woman’s desire to now keep the embryos. The woman, Mimi Lee, had argued that cancer made it risky for her to get pregnant, so the embryos were her last chance to have her own genetic child.
Her ex-husband, Stephen Findley, wanted to discard the embryos in accordance with the agreement he and Lee signed while married. He worried in part that Lee would use any children to take financial advantage of him, according to the ruling.
Lee’s attorneys said no California court had previously ruled in such a case. A Pennsylvania court three years ago awarded frozen embryos to a woman who also said they may be her only way to have a child because of breast cancer treatment despite the objections of her ex-husband. An Illinois judge last year also sided with a woman who was infertile in her fight over embryos with an ex-boyfriend.
Read full, original post: Judge: Divorced California couple’s embryos can be discarded
