In 2009, William Marotta of Topeka, Kansas responded to an ad he saw online. The ad had been posted by a lesbian couple seeking a sperm donor. Marotta met with Angela Bauer and Jennifer Schreiner. The three signed a document that purportedly relieved Marotta of any obligation for child support, financial obligations, or other responsibility regarding a child conceived from his semen. Shortly thereafter, Marotta dropped a container of semen off at the couple’s house. The women then successfully impregnated Schreiner using Marotta’s seed.
In 2010, Schreiner and Bauer broke up. After the breakup, Schreiner sought and received public assistance from the government. When the government found out that Marotta was the biological father, it demanded in excess of $6,000 as compensation for past benefits.
In October 2012 the Kansas Department for Children and Families sued Marotta claiming that the waiver he had signed was invalid because he did not involve a doctor in the artificial insemination as required by Kansas law. Litigation is currently pending.
Marotta was quoted as saying that he was “a little scared about where this is going to go, primarily for financial reasons.”