Contracts Are Considered When Using Assisted Reproduction Technology

Two recent decisions highlight the importance of contracts between parties in cases involving assisted reproduction technology (ART).  In Pennsylvania, the Superior Court found that television personality, Sherri Shepherd was indeed the legal mother of a child born in a surrogacy arrangement.  For the full story click here.   Basically, Shepherd and her then husband, Lamar Sally entered into a contract with a gestational carrier to bear a child for them.  During the pregnancy, the couple began having marital problems, and Shepherd did not want to sign the necessary paperwork to be named on the birth certificate of the child.  The Court, nonetheless, enforced the gestational carrier contract where both Shepherd and Sally were named as the intended parents of the child and found that they were the legal parents of the child.