Lesbian Couple Sue Over New Jersey Rules for Fertility Treatment

Five years ago, Erin and Marianne Krupa chose to start a family. They moved to Montclair, N.J., from a more conservative environment in North Carolina, and decided that Erin would carry their first child.

Erin Krupa remembered her fertility doctor looking her in the eye and promising to help her become pregnant.

But there were complications. At an appointment with her doctor in 2013, Ms. Krupa, then 33, learned that she had benign cysts on her uterus and Stage 3 endometriosis, in which the tissue that normally lines the inside of the uterus grows outside. That meant she was infertile.Donor

Despite her doctor’s assurances that insurance would pay for fertility treatment, Ms. Krupa’s provider, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield, denied coverage. The company cited a state insurance mandate from 2001 that required most women under 35 — no matter their sexual orientation — to demonstrate their infertility through “two years of unprotected sexual intercourse.”

Now the Krupas, along with two other women, are suing the commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Banking and Insurance, claiming the mandate discriminates against their sexual orientation — essentially forcing infertile homosexual women to pay for costly procedures to try to become pregnant.

“These women are already going through what can be a difficult experience, and they have the added stress of affording it financially and the added insult of being treated like a second-class citizen,” said Grace Cretcher, a lawyer for the plaintiffs.

The state mandate requires most major insurance companies to cover medically necessary treatments for infertile clients. It defines infertility as the inability to impregnate another person, the inability to carry a pregnancy to live birth or the inability to conceive after one or two years of unprotected sex, depending on the woman’s age.

New York Times, August 8, 2016 by Megan Jula

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Supreme Court Blocks Order Allowing Transgender Student Restroom Choice

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Wednesday temporarily blocked a court order that had allowed a transgender boy to use the boys’ bathroom in a Virginia high school.

The vote was 5 to 3, with Justice Stephen G. Breyer joining the court’s more conservative members “as a courtesy.” He said that this would preserve the status quo until the court decided whether to hear the case. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan dissented.

The court’s order has no effect on any other case.

new york probate process

The gavel of a judge in court

The move came amid a national debate over transgender rights. A North Carolina law that requires transgender people to use bathrooms in government buildings that correspond with the gender listed on their birth certificates has drawn protests, boycotts and lawsuits. A directive from the Obama administration threatening schools with the loss of federal money for discrimination based on gender identity has been challenged in court by more than 20 states.

The case in the Supreme Court concerns Gavin Grimm, who was born female but identifies as a male and will soon start his senior year at Gloucester High School in southeastern Virginia. For a time, school administrators allowed Mr. Grimm to use the boys’ bathroom, but the local school board adopted a policy that required students to use the bathrooms and locker rooms for their “corresponding biological genders.” The board added that “students with gender identity issues” would be allowed to use private bathrooms.

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New York Times – By ADAM LIPTAK

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Was judge pushing anti-gay agenda?

Walker appointee rapped for treatment of same-sex couple in surrogacy case.

A former Dane County judge appointed by Gov. Scott Walker likened surrogacy to “human trafficking” and took highly unusual steps that added tens of thousands of dollars in costs for a gay couple seeking to add to their family.

Judge James Troupis’ actions, which included denying parental rights to the couple, were overturned by another Dane County judge and have also been appealed to the state Court of Appeals. And they arguably violated the ethical standards in place for members of the judiciary.anonymous sperm donors

Troupis, who has since left the bench, in August 2015 appointed a Waukesha County law firm that employs an outspoken opponent of same-sex marriage to assist in the case. That resulted in hefty additional legal fees for Jay Timmons and Rick Olson as they attempted to become the legal parents to their infant son, born to a surrogate in Wisconsin. And the couple says the judge wreaked emotional havoc on their family by keeping the child’s legal status in limbo for 10 months.

In early July, Dane County Judge Peter Anderson vacated Troupis’ order, giving Timmons and Olson parental rights to Jacob, who will be a year old in August. Troupis had already terminated the parental rights of the surrogate, who never contested the contract she had with Timmons and Olson.

Anderson raised serious concerns about his former colleague’s conduct in the case, calling it “harsh,” “weird” and “faulty,” according to an online account by Timmons of his family’s ordeal. Anderson said Troupis’ decision also contained a “manifest error” of the law, Timmons wrote.

Kevin St. John, one of the attorneys for the couple, did not return a call seeking comment on the appeal or whether his clients intend to file a complaint against Troupis with the Wisconsin Judicial Commission. The code of judicial conduct prohibits judges from, among other things, performing their duties with bias or prejudice.

“A judge may not, in the performance of judicial duties, by words or conduct, manifest bias or prejudice, including bias or prejudice based upon race, gender, religion, national origin, disability, age, sexual orientation or socioeconomic status, and may not knowingly permit staff, court officials and others subject to the judge’s direction and control to do so.”

Timmons and Olson live in McLean, Va., a high-end suburb of Washington, D.C. Timmons is president and CEO of the National Association of Manufacturers, which, according to his bio, is the “largest manufacturing association in the United States representing small and large manufacturers in every industrial sector.” Timmons also formerly worked for several Republican lawmakers.

The couple, who also have two young daughters, received a gift of two frozen embryos from friends about two years ago. After spending about a year researching legal issues, they sought out a surrogate in Wisconsin, believing state law here clearly allowed a same-gender couple to be recognized as parents of a child born through surrogacy. According to court documents, the surrogate was paid $35,000.

About two months before the expected birth, on June 25, 2015, reserve judge Sarah O’Brien held a hearing on the couple’s petition for parental rights. O’Brien’s interim order awarding them parental rights was expected to be finalized upon Jacob’s birth.

by Judith Davidoff, July 18, 2016

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California Approves LGBT History Lessons for Classrooms

References to gay Americans and events start in second grade.

SAN FRANCISCO—In second grade, California students will learn about families with two moms or two dads. Two years later, while studying how immigrants have shaped the Golden State, they will hear how New York native Harvey Milk became a pioneering gay politician in San Francisco.

California education officials approved those changes in classroom instruction Thursday to comply with the nation’s first law requiring public schools to include prominent gay people and LGBT-rights milestones in history classes.gay family values

The State Board of Education adopted the updates as part of a broader overhaul of California’s history and social-science curriculum. Dozens of people attending the meeting criticized the way Muslims, Hindus and Jews are discussed, but no one spoke out against the new treatment of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights.

“We are proud to represent a diverse state, and we are proud that this framework reflects the state that we serve,” said Lauryn Wild, a Southern California curriculum specialist who chairs the advisory commission that produced the new guidelines.

They weave references to gay Americans and events throughout the history and social-science curriculum, starting in second grade through discussions about diverse families and again in fourth grade with lessons on California’s place in the gay-rights movement.

The guidelines also touch on the topics in fifth and eighth grade—looking at gender roles in the 18th and 19th centuries and examples of individuals who flouted them—and throughout high school.

A capstone of sorts will come in U.S. government courses, where seniors would learn about the 2015 Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide and recent court cases involving bathroom access for transgender students.

The changes are designed to satisfy legislation passed by California lawmakers five years ago that added LGBT Americans and people with disabilities to the list of social and ethnic groups whose contributions schools are supposed to teach and must appear in kindergarten through eighth-grade textbooks.

The legislation also prohibited classroom materials that reflect adversely on gays or particular religions.

The law took effect in January 2012, but its implementation was slowed by opponents’ failed attempts to overturn it, competing educational priorities and budget cuts that stalled work on drafting recommendations for the school board and textbook purchases.

While some school districts and teachers made efforts to incorporate gay history since the law passed, many were nervous about tackling the topic without explicit guidance from the state, said Carolyn Laub, a consultant for a group of LGBT parents called Our Family Coalition.

“If educators perceive, rightly or wrongly, they may not get support from their administration if they face pushback from a parent who says, ‘I don’t want you talking to my kid about that,’ they are reluctant to do a whole lot of inclusion,” Ms. Laub said.

Associated Press  -July 14, 2016

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GOP Passes ‘Most Anti-LGBT Platform’ in History, Log Cabin Republicans Shocked

Led by some of the nation’s most anti-lgbt politicians and even the head of an anti-gay hate group, Republicans late Tuesday voted on and passed the final draft of the GOP 2016 platform.

The Log Cabin Republicans issued a fundraising email immediately, shocked, apparently, telling supporters, “moments ago, the Republican Party passed the most anti-LGBT Platform in the Party’s 162-year history.”politics, corrosive politics

 

“Opposition to marriage equality, nonsense about bathrooms, an endorsement of the debunked psychological practice of “pray the gay away” — it’s all in there,” the email reads, as the Miami Herald’s Steve Rothaus reports.

“This isn’t my GOP, and I know it’s not yours either,” wrote Log Cabin President Gregory T. Angelo. “Heck, it’s not even Donald Trump’s!,” he claims, although that’s debatable.

“When given a chance to follow the lead of our presumptive presidential nominee and reach out to the LGBT community in the wake of the awful terrorist massacre in Orlando on the gay nightclub Pulse, the Platform Committee said NO.”

As NCRM has been reporting all week, along with passing an amendment calling for an unconstitutional “religious freedom” bill, the First Amendment Defense Act (FADA) to become law, the GOP platform committee passed a plank that effectively says children raised in a “traditional” family are better off than children raised by same-sex parents or single parents.

thenewcivilrightsmovement.com, July 13, 2016

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In win for gay couples, Maryland high court recognizes de facto parents rights

Maryland’s highest court has ruled that non-biological parents, de facto parents,  who live with and help raise children also have parental rights, overturning a 2008 decision that gay and lesbian advocates considered devastating to same-sex couples.

In a unanimous ruling issued Thursday, the Maryland Court of Appeals ruled that family-court judges can consider whether persons are de facto parents in custody and visitation cases. Advocates say Maryland was one of a few states that considered such parents strangers in the eyes of the law.

De facto parents can include the partner of a lesbian who undergoes artificial insemination, a gay man whose partner adopts a child from a country that does not allow same-sex couples to jointly adopt, or a straight man who raises a child with a woman for years without formal adoption.gay parents adoption

Until the 2008 court decision, such people generally had the ability to maintain some parental rights in Maryland even when their relationships with their partners crumbled.

Then the Court of Appeals ruled against a Baltimore County woman who sought custody or visitation rights with a girl who had been adopted by her ex-partner. The court said “third party” parents should not be treated differently from other third parties seeking custody. That meant they would need to show exceptional circumstances or that the legal parent was unfit in order to be awarded time with children they had helped raise.

This week’s ruling concerned a different case and reversed the precedent set by the court in 2008. Denying rights to third-party parents “is ‘clearly wrong’ and has been undermined by the passage of time,” Judge Sally Adkins wrote in the decision.

LGBT advocates hailed the ruling for correcting what they saw as a continuing injustice against the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, even after voters legalized same-sex marriage in 2012.

“Now Maryland joins the majority of other states in taking those parents and children out of limbo and putting them in solid legal footing,” said Jer Welter, a lawyer with FreeState Justice who represented plaintiff Michael Conover in the case ruled on this week.

Mr. Conover is a transgender man who had married a woman before undergoing his gender transition. Their wedding took place in the District, which legalized same-sex marriage before Maryland did. Courts treated him and his ex-wife as a same-sex couple for the purpose of the dispute.

Brittany Conover gave birth in 2010 to a child, Jaxon, who was fathered by a sperm donor selected with the input of Mr. Conover, then known as Michelle, according to court records. The couple separated the next year and divorced in 2013.

Ms. Conover stopped allowing her spouse to visit in 2012. She argued in a later custody battle that her former partner never adopted Jaxon and was not listed as a parent on the child’s birth certificate.

Lower courts agreed that Mr. Conover lacked parental rights. The Court of Appeals ruling returns the case to a Washington County judge with the concept of a de facto parent restored in law.

“I am elated that the state’s highest court has ruled that people like me should have our relationships with our children legally protected,” Mr. Conover said in a statement.

R. Martin Palmer Jr., an attorney for Ms. Conover, said the court usurped the role of lawmakers in defining a parent and may have created a situation in which stepfathers can take control of children from capable mothers.

By Fenit Nirappil / The Washington Post, July 9, 2016

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Judge: Lesbian has no parental rights because she didn’t marry partner

A woman whose same-sex relationship ended before same-sex marriage became legal doesn’t have parental rights to a child born to her partner in 2008, the Michigan appeals court said Wednesday.

The decision, which comes a year after the U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for same-sex marriage across the country, will stand as a key precedent in similar disputes in Michigan involving children who were raised by gays and lesbians in relationships that ended.

adoption for gay couples

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Michelle Lake and Kerri Putnam were together for 13 years until 2014 but didn’t marry during that time. Lake said she deserves to enjoy the rights that would have been granted to her if they had been married.

Putnam gave birth to a boy, now 8, during their relationship, but she no longer allows Lake to see him.

“We simply do not believe it is appropriate for courts to retroactively impose the legal ramifications of marriage onto unmarried couples several years after their relationship has ended,” the appeals court said. “That, in our view, is beyond the role of the judiciary.”

The court said Lake has no parental rights under Michigan law because the boy wasn’t born during a marriage.

Associated Press – July 7, 2016

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Same sex couples win court battle over child adoption discrimination

In a significant ruling on Tuesday, the Czech Republic’s Constitutional Court overturned a law which prevented individual gays and lesbians living in registered partnership from adopting children. The judge argued that such a ban was discriminatory, since gays and lesbians not living in such an official partnership are allowed to do so. However, the ruling does not allow same-sex partners to adopt children as a couple.

ays and lesbians in the Czech Republic can live in an officially registered partnership since 2016, when the Czech parliament changed the law. But while it granted the partners similar rights enjoyed by heterosexual married couples, such as rights to inheritance, it did not allow them to adopt children. That now has changed with Tuesday’s ruling of the Constitutional Court.adoption

Adéla Horáková, a lawyer for PROUD, a Czech initiative promoting the rights of homosexuals, says the ruling is a small step ahead, but stresses that there are still many further moves to take:

“It is something that was almost inevitable from the beginning of adoption of this provision, because it is clearly unconstitutional and illogical. There are many other inequalities given by law for same sex couples as parents or just as couples. One of them being the fact that they cannot get married, another can be that they cannot adopt jointly a child or that a partner may not adopt biological child of his or her partner, so called second parent adoption.”

The decision of the Constitutional Court is essential not only for some 1,800 gays and lesbians living in registered partnership, but also for those who might have postponed the registration due to the ban on adoption. Adéla Horáková says it is difficult to say how many people will actually take advantage of the ruling:

“It is hard to estimate how many gays and lesbians change their opinion or will feel the impulse to apply for adoption. We hope the more the better so that we can see more same sex parents adopting children and show the society they are just as capable and just as loving parents as anybody else.”

29-06-2016 15:02 | Ruth Fraňková, Radio.CZ

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Italian High Court Makes Gay Adoption Easier, Not Automatic

Italy’s highest court has made it easier for gay adoption, gays to adopt a partner’s biological child but the decision does not give long-sought automatic recognition to the families of same-sex couples.

A Cassation Court ruling on Wednesday confirmed a lower-court decision permitting gay adoption, or the so-called “step-child” adoption in cases where the family bond is well-established. The gay rights group Famiglie Arcobaleno (Rainbow Families) called the decision a step forward but said it falls short of its goal of having immediate recognition at birth of both parents in same-sex unions.adoption

Italy earlier this year became the last holdout in Western Europe to legally recognize civil unions for gay and lesbian couples, but only after sacrificing a hotly contested provision to allow gay adoption.

Associated Press via ABCnews.com – June 22,2016

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Men Having Babies’ Gay Parenting Assistance Program Expanded to Help Prospective Surrogacy Dads with Discount on Fertility Medications

Men Having Babies (MHB) Gay Parenting Assistance Program (GPAP) announced today that EMD Serono, the biopharmaceutical business of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, in the U.S. and Canada, will provide eligible prospective gay parents with up to a 75% discount on select fertility medications for use by their surrogates when redeemed at an EMD Serono participating pharmacy.

GPAP annually provides dozens of prospective parents with over a million dollars worth of cash grants, discounts and free services from more than fifty leading service providers. “GPAP was created to promote affordable surrogacy services for gay men, the first such program to do so,” said Ron Poole-Dayan, the executive director of Men Having Babies. “In the last two years more than 300 couples became eligible for substantial discounts off the cost of surrogacy services, and more than 40 couples have received direct Stage II financial assistance, including grants and free service. Ten babies were already born to Stage II couples, and many more are on their way.”

“Our mission at EMD Serono is to advocate for people who want to have a child,” said Craig Millian, Sr. Vice President, US Fertility & Endocrinology at EMD Serono. “We are excited to be the first manufacturer to provide financial assistance, in the form of discounted medicine, directly to the gay community. Most importantly, we are thrilled to work with Men Having Babies to try to help more and more people build families.”Men Having Babies

The collaboration will be officially announced at a special dinner reception at the upcoming Surrogacy and Gay Parenting conference in Dallas, TX, this Father’s Day, which EMD Serono is co-sponsoring. The conference is based on the successful model of programs MHB has already organized in NYC, LA, San Francisco, Chicago, Brussels and Tel Aviv. It will bring together under one roof community activists, experts, parents and surrogates who will share their experiences. Prospective parents at all stages of their journey are encouraged to attend – from those who are just beginning to weigh their parenting options to those who are already in process.

Some of the other sponsors of the Dallas conference are also major supporters of GPAP, including Simple Surrogacy and Fertility Specialists of Texas, which have already helped several couples that have had children or are currently pregnant.

“For a same-sex couple, conceiving a child through third-party infertility treatments can be incredibly expensive,” said Jerald S. Goldstein, MD, medical director and founder of Fertility Specialists of Texas. “Through strong support initiatives like the Gay Parenting Assistance Program (GPAP), having a biological child is becoming more of a reality for intended fathers worldwide. We are proud to partner with Men Having Babies and to be a continued participating infertility center with GPAP.”

NEW YORK, NY (PRWEB) JUNE 16, 2016

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