Is responsibility for a child based on genetics? This question Is it true that men are forced to pay child support for children they didn&#39;t consent to have? and some related popped up on my side bar and prompted a thought experiment. Suppose a prospective parent stole cells from an unwilling donor and used them to conceive a child. Typically the cells would be eggs or sperm but these could be created by IVG (in vitro gametogenisis). Is the child entitled to support from the genetic parent (who is actually a victim of theft)? Assume no sex was involved. The cells were taken without permission. Maybe in secret during a medical procedure or stolen from a lab where they were intended for use in a different medical procedure. I would have assumed not but the rules are currently only different for sperm and egg donation as part of an &quot;statutorily authorized arrangement&quot; with a willing donor (according to this answer). I guess this would have to be determined by a test-case in a court. But presumably the other biological parent would have to take full responsibility in this case. This is not the main question but if you want to make it even more interesting. What if the cells were 'found' rather than stolen. Say someone scrapes their knee and someone else obtains a tissue sample from the scrape. What if genetic material from multiple people is used? (e.g. https://www.newscientist.com/article/2107219-exclusive-worlds-first-baby-born-with-new-3-parent-technique/) What if the child is produced in an artificial womb (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/health-50056405) While these technologies are not viable yet they are all being worked on. In this case I would presume those deliberately participating in the creation of the child to take full responsibility. This then raises the odd question of a lab team or corporation possibly being assigned the status of parents and thus made liable for child support.
The legal responsibility to support a child arises from &quot;parentage&quot; and not &quot;genetic relatedness&quot;, therefore one of two identical twins will not be assigned such responsibility simply because of genetic relatedness. However, genetic facts can enter into a legal proceeding for support, and can be evidence to establish parentage. In the US, the rules for determining parentage are generally established by the Uniform Parentage Act, instantiated for instance in Washington state RCW Chapter 26.26A. RCW 26.26A.100 spells out the full set of rules: A parent-child relationship is established between an individual and a child if: (1) The individual gives birth to the child, except as otherwise provided in RCW 26.26A.700 through 26.26A.785; (2) There is a presumption under RCW 26.26A.115 of the individual's parentage of the child, unless the presumption is overcome in a judicial proceeding or a valid denial of parentage is made under RCW 26.26A.200 through 26.26A.265; (3) The individual is adjudicated a parent of the child under RCW 26.26A.400 through 26.26A.515; (4) The individual adopts the child; (5) The individual acknowledges parentage of the child under RCW 26.26A.200 through 26.26A.265, unless the acknowledgment is rescinded under RCW 26.26A.235 or successfully challenged under RCW 26.26A.200 through 26.26A.265 or 26.26A.400 through 26.26A.515; (6) The individual's parentage of the child is established under RCW 26.26A.600 through 26.26A.635; or (7) The individual's parentage of the child is established under RCW 26.26A.705 through 26.26A.730. §§300-355 govern the use of genetic tests in determining parentage, according to which genetic test results can be evidence of parentage, but §§600 ff specifically address assisted reproduction and surrogacy agreements – RCW 26.26A.610 for example specifically assigns &quot;parentage&quot; to a person who consents to assisted reproduction by a woman with the intent to be a parent of a child, and under §605, a donor is not a parent of a child conceived by assisted reproduction.
Does &quot;duty to rescue&quot; apply to a child that one has no direct responsibility for? And I am, certainly under English law, guilty of a crime. No, not necessarily, because a failure to act does not automatically create criminal liability in England and Wales. Most offences require a combination of a physical act and the intent to carry it out - often referred to as the coincidence of actus reus and mens rea. If one or both of these elements are missing (or cannot be proved) then there is no offence unless there is a specific Duty of Care imposed by law which obligates a person to prevent, or mitigate the risk of, harm coming to someone or something. There is a simple mnemonic that may assist with identifying whether or not there is such a DUTY Dangerous situation created... In R v Miller [1983] 2 AC 161 Miller fell asleep while smoking a cigarette, then woke up to see his matress smouldering. Instead of calling for help or doing anything about it, he went to sleep in another room so was convicted of arson - not for setting the fire but for failing to do anything about it. This would be analogous with someone tampering with the signs to incorrectly say that the deep end of the pool is the shallow end thus causing the child to be out of his depth and drown. Under statute, contract or by public office... In R v Dytham [1979] QB 722 a police officer was convicted of misconduct in a public office because he stood by and did nothing as a man was beaten to death. For the OP: a lifeguard will have a duty of care, under contract, to act in order to rescue the child in the OP. Take it upon oneself... In R v Stone &amp; Dobinson [1977] 1 QB 354 the defendants took on the responsibility for caring for a vulnerable person who later died due to their neglect. In the OP's scenario, this might equate to someone announcing they will act as an impromptu lifeguard but then do nothing to save the child from drowning. Young persons... Anyone who has a parental relationship with a child has a legal obligation to look after the health and welfare of that child. In the OP's scenario, if the parent was absent, too drunk etc so could not raise the alarm this may be a breach of this duty of care and make them liable for the death of their child.
Chief Justice Roberts, dissenting, says (at p. 24): The equal protection analysis might be different, in my view, if we were confronted with a more focused challenge to the denial of certain tangible benefits. That indicates to me that there is probably a majority on the court that thinks same-sex couples should have the same adoption rights and other tangible benefits as opposite-sex couples, but that would have to be tested in court. Regarding level-of-scrutiny, this opinion says nothing on the issue. But, given that Justice Kennedy follows a fundamental rights analysis, it could be argued that it is likely strict scrutiny, or at least a level of scrutiny higher than rational basis. Vacco v. Quill, 521 U.S. 793 (1997), citing Romer v. Evans, 517 U. S. 620, 631 (1996) (emphasis added, internal punctuation removed): If a legislative classification or distinction neither burdens a fundamental right nor targets a suspect class, we will uphold it so long as it bears a rational relation to some legitimate end.
Disclaimer: I don't know the specific regulations of New Jersey, so this mostly describes the general practise in the United States. However, it seems the rules are roughly similar in all states. During a divorce proceeding the court ordered the father to pay 1xxx a month in child support through the court/state supervision arrangement. This is common in the United States - child support payments are usually not sent directly from one parent to the other, instead the paying parent sends money to a government agency (or has it taken from their wages). This agency is usually called State Disbursement Unit - though in New Jersey the agency responsible is the New Jersey Family Support Payment Center (NJFSPC). So the father was probably ordered to pay via NJFSPC. Will it harm the case if the mother retrieves the money? assuming she notifies the court or her attorney? Or should she refuse the money? No, this should not harm the case. As you write, the mother should definitely inform the court and / or NJFSPC about the payment (the lawyer should know how to handle this). If the court order requires the father to pay via NJFSPC, paying directly to the mother is already a violation - so the father is likely not acting legally. While the accepted payment will likely count against the child support owed, it will not reduce the claim for child support in any other way - in particular it does not invalidate or reduce the court order to pay via NJFSPC.
The husband of the mother of a child is presumed to be that child's parent until that presumption is disestablished. In New York State, when a child is born to a married mother, a court may decline to consider DNA evidence when it is not in the best interests of the child to do so. In substance (although not exactly from a legal perspective), a failure to promptly contest the paternity of a child of a married mother gives rise to a de facto adoption. Article 5 of the New York Family Court Act in its definitions section, § 512, makes clear that it applies only to children born out of wedlock (and it too has an equitable paternity term at § 532). So, the statutory deadline in Article 5 allowing a child with no legally determined father to have a determination made at any time before the child turns age twenty-one does not apply to this case. Instead, this case is governed by New York Family Court Act, Article 4. New York Family Court Act § 418(a), which governs paternity cases where a child is born during a marriage provides that: (a) The court, on its own motion or motion of any party, when paternity is contested, shall order the mother, the child and the alleged father to submit to one or more genetic marker or DNA marker tests of a type generally acknowledged as reliable by an accreditation body designated by the secretary of the federal department of health and human services and performed by a laboratory approved by such an accreditation body and by the commissioner of health or by a duly qualified physician to aid in the determination of whether the alleged father is or is not the father of the child. No such test shall be ordered, however, upon a written finding by the court that it is not in the best interests of the child on the basis of res judicata, equitable estoppel or the presumption of legitimacy of a child born to a married woman. The record or report of the results of any such genetic marker or DNA test shall be received in evidence, pursuant to subdivision (e) of rule forty-five hundred eighteen of the civil practice law and rules where no timely objection in writing has been made thereto. Any order pursuant to this section shall state in plain language that the results of such test shall be admitted into evidence, pursuant to rule forty-five hundred eighteen of the civil practice law and rules absent timely objections thereto and that if such timely objections are not made, they shall be deemed waived and shall not be heard by the court. If the record or report of results of any such genetic marker or DNA test or tests indicate at least a ninety-five percent probability of paternity, the admission of such record or report shall create a rebuttable presumption of paternity, and, if unrebutted, shall establish the paternity of and liability for the support of a child pursuant to this article and article five of this act. If DNA evidence is considered, the biological father will be determined to be the father, but if it is not considered, the husband will continue to be the legal father. A leading case exploring when the best interests of the child test prevails over DNA evidence from New York is In the Matter of Shondel J., v. Mark D., 853 N.E.2d 610 (N.Y. July 6, 2006). In a key passage, it states: Equitable estoppel is gender neutral. In Matter of Sharon GG. v Duane HH. (63 2 859 [1984], affg 95 AD2d 466 [3d Dept 1983]), we affirmed an order of the Appellate Division dismissing a paternity petition in which a mother sought to compel her husband to submit to a blood test as a means of challenging his paternity. We agreed with the Appellate Division that the mother should be estopped. As that court pointed out, the mother expressed no question about her child's paternity until some two and a half years after the child's birth. She had held the child out as her husband's, accepted his support for the child while she and her husband lived together and after they separated, and permitted her husband and child to form strong ties together. Estoppel may also preclude a man who claims to be a child's biological father from asserting his paternity when he acquiesced in the establishment of a strong parent-child bond between the child and another man. The rationale is that the child would be harmed by a determination that someone else is the biological father. For example, in Purificati v Paricos (154 AD2d 360 [2d Dept 1989]), a boy's biological father who did not seek to establish his paternity until more than three years after the child's birth, and who acquiesced as a relationship flourished between the boy and his mother's former husband, was estopped from claiming paternity. The courts "impose equitable estoppel to protect the status interests of a child in an already recognized and operative parent-child relationship" ( In re Baby Boy C., , 84 NY2d 91, 102 n [1994]). Finally, the Appellate Division has repeatedly concluded that a man who has held himself out to be the father of a child, so that a parent-child relationship developed between the two, may be estopped from denying paternity.2 Where a child justifiably relies on the representations of a man that he is her father with the result that she will be harmed by the man's denial of paternity, the man may be estopped from asserting that denial.3 . . . Given the statute recognizing paternity by estoppel, a man who harbors doubts about his biological paternity of a child has a choice to make. He may either put the doubts aside and initiate a parental relationship with the child, or insist on a scientific test of paternity before initiating a parental relationship. A possible result of the first option is paternity by estoppel; the other course creates the risk of damage to the relationship with the woman. It is not an easy choice, but at times, the law intersects with the province of personal relationships and some strain is inevitable. This should not be allowed to distract the Family Court from its principal purpose in paternity and support proceedings -- to serve the best interests of the child. This continues to be good law. See, e.g. In the Matter of Thomas T. v. Luba R., 148 A.D.3d 912 (March 15, 2017) (paternity by estoppel established when child at age four did not know biological father's name and had established a strong father-child-like bond with mother's currently partner citing Shondel). Under the circumstances, if any of the three parties: the mother, the husband, or the biological father, sought to prevent consideration of DNA evidence after ten to fifteen years of marriage during which paternity was not denied, it is very likely that the Court would agree and not change the legal paternity of the child. In this case, the biological father would not gain legal visitation rights and would not owe child support, and neither the husband nor the mother would lose their presumed parent status, nor would they be entitled to child support. If the husband, mother and biological father mutually agreed otherwise, the paternity by estoppel argument might be overcome and any issue of support would be governed by the mutual agreement (although a guardian ad litem for the child might be appointed sua sponte by the Court and have standing to object to the agreement on behalf of the child notwithstanding the mutual agreement of the other three parties). This would terminate husband's status as a parent and entitle biological father to visitation. But, otherwise paternity by estoppel would prevail. Incidentally, this statute and case law position is constitutional. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that a man who conceives a child with a married woman does not have a due process right in establishing his paternity of the child, so any right that the biological father may have arises from statute and the common law, rather than from the U.S. Constitution. Michael H. v. Gerald D. (U.S. 1989).
The experimenter actually respects the subjects right of autonomy, and because this is just pretend, there is no imaginable legal action. There is a (maybe not so) hypothetical scenario where A gives an electric shock to B. Variant 1 is that A sneaks up on B and shocks him: that is assault and is legally actionable. Variant 2 is that B consents to the shock. Because of consent, B cannot sue A unless the shock was misrepresented (purportedly 2 volts and 1 milliamp, actually 120 volts at 10 amp). Variant 3 involves strapping B down (with permission). B can at any time withdraw consent. If B withdraws consent and A continues to shock him, this is probably assault, especially if B is restrained. If B lamely says &quot;cuttitout&quot; but makes no effort to leave (being unrestrained) the jury may find that the appearance of withdrawing consent was not sincere, since he could have just gotten off the electric chair, unless the last shock paralyzed him. This is a fact-intensive analysis. In the video, the actions of the &quot;subject&quot; are not credible cases of withdrawing consent, it is just Youtube theater. Here, A and B are just two kids horsing around, in the US. Things get more complicated when you do things under the auspices of an organization required to do a review of such experiments (e.g. the high school or university). The theory is that the institution will have explicit standards and will review the experiment, and somewhere in there there is a part where the subject is told that they can leave at any time and if they have problems, they can contact X (the IRB for the institution). There is generally no legal fallout for the experimenter, but there can be institutional fallout (getting fired / banned). Actually physically restraining a subject is, however, legally actionable: but saying &quot;I really need you to continue the experiment&quot; is not legally actionable, though may well result in IRB sanctions. Suppose the university approves an experiment with restrained subjects and increasing shocks. There is a point at which they cannot approve the procedure, and if they do, they are potentially subject to legal consequences for the institution. Investigating nuances of IRB actions would be better carried out on Academia SE (&quot;has anyone ever had funding suspended for sloppy IRB practices&quot;). This is not a medical experiment: if it were, other laws would be relevant (hence you cannot engage in unauthorized, unreviewed medical experiments on your brother).
No Let's consider a similar scenario. If you made a beverage which poisoned a number of people, would you be absolved of liability because you gave it away for free? Of course not. As there is no contract between you, they would have to bring an action against you in the tort of negligence or negligent misstatement OR under consumer protection law. To succeed at tort they would need to prove that you owed them a duty of care; from Donoghue v Stevenson "You must take reasonable care to avoid acts or omissions which you can reasonable foresee would be likely to injure ... persons who are so closely and directly affected by my act that I ought reasonably have them in contemplation ...". Most cases will founder on your inability to foresee the use to which your software may be put. Consumer law is jurisdiction specific but they generally contain warranties that what you provide (gratis or otherwise) is fit for purpose, merchantable and that you do not make false and misleading statements. There is a chance that a case brought under this sort of law could succeed as you have not limited the purpose, specifically declared that it is not of merchantable quality and have (presumable) said what it does so that, if it doesn't do what you said, you have been misleading and deceptive.
A conviction isn't ever impossible, but it could well be highly unjust. Indeed, there is a current case where a man alleged that he was the murder, though his identical twin brother was convicted. This article indicates that identical twins are not necessarily genetically indistinguishable. Assuming there is a lack of positive evidence such as fingerprints or an alibi which clearly identifies one versus the other, then one would predict no conviction because there would be a highly reasonable doubt. See the case of Orlando Nemnhard, where one of two twins did it but the DA concluded that they couldn't prove which one, so the charges were dropped.