Dr Donald Cline was confirmed as the father of at least 48 children born in the 1970s and 1980s
This fertility doctor secretly used his own s.p.e.r.m to impregnate women who were patients seeking artificial insemination. He has been confirmed as the father of at least 48 children.
Dr Donald Cline told the patients he would source “fresh s.p.e.r.m” from medical students. However, he used his own in procedures on dozens of unwitting women in Indiana, US, in the 1970s and 1980s.
This secret only emerged when Jacoba Ballard, who from an early age knew that she was conceived using a sperm donor, began searching for any half-siblings. She turned to commercial DNA testing.
The woman only expected to find a few. But after her hunt led to Cline admitting what he had done, she said: “I feel like our mothers were violated.”
Liz White, now 68, who is mother of Matt after Cline i.n.s.e.m.i.n.a.t.e.d her over five months in 1981, said: “I feel like I was r.a.p.e.d 15 times.” The woman remembered how his office was filled with pictures of babies that he had helped conceive. That is a detail she said did not strike her at the time but she now finds deeply unsettling.
Cline, who retired in 2009, got a one-year suspended sentence in 2017 after he admitted two counts of obstructing justice. No other charges were filed because Indiana law does not explicitly ban fertility doctors using their own sperm.
In 2014, Jacoba, now 40, began searching for half-siblings sharing her donor. She used an online forum for adoptees and donor-conceived people, then she found a woman linked to Cline. And as soon as she had seen her photo, she knew they were related.
That woman connected her with another one whose mother also used Cline – and had a sister. The four of them decided to take DNA tests with 23andMe. There doctors confirmed they were related – and also revealed four further half-siblings were on the database.
Doctor Cline had told his patients that he used each donor for only three successful pregnancies. But they had proof one was used in at least eight.
The birth years also ranged from 1979 to 1986 – and medical students, which Cline said he used, only do three-year residencies. The number of matches grew after further investigating and testing.
Heather Woock, now 35, was stunned when being contacted through her ancestry.com account, set up when her husband got her a DNA test as a gift due to her interest in genealogy.
When a group of half-siblings, including Jacoba, finally met Cline, this man confessed to using his own sperm.
At the time of his trial, Cline apologised “for the pain his actions caused”. He did not specify how many times he had done it but court documents from Marion County in Indiana revealed Cline told Jacoba he had used his own sperm about 50 times.
Many of his children have formed close bonds and Jacoba said: “We feel cheated we didn’t get to know each other growing up.”
And when DNA testing grows in popularity, the half-siblings expected their numbers to keep rising.
Source: https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/us-news/fertility-doctor-admits-impregnating-women-14159538
