Following a precedent set on January 25 by the Albany-based N.Y. 3rd Department Appellate Division, the Brooklyn-based N.Y. 2nd Department Appellate Division issued a unanimous decision on February 21 ordering the dismissal of a sperm donor’s attempt to establish parentage and get legal visitation with a child born to a married lesbian couple.
As in the earlier case, Christopher YY v. Jessica ZZ & Nichole ZZ, 2018 WL 541768, 2018 N.Y. App. Div. … <Read More>
Filling a gap in New York family law left open by the New York Court of Appeals’ 2016 decision In the Matter of Brooke S.B., 28 N.Y.3d 1, 61 N.E.3d 48839 N.Y.S.3d 89, Nassau County Family Court Judge Thomas Rademaker held in J.C. v. N.P., a decision published by the New York Law Journal on September 27, 2017, that the doctrine of equitable estoppel could be used to establish the standing of a lesbian co-parent … <Read More>
U.S. District Judge Daniel D. Crabtree, who had ruled on November 4, 2014, that the Kansas constitutional amendment and statutes banning same-sex marriage were unconstitutional, has issued a final ruling in that case, Marie v. Mosier, 2016 WL 3951744 (D. Kan., July 22, 2016), effectively finding that Kansas officials cannot be trusted to comply voluntarily with the Supreme Court’s marriage equality ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, 135 S. Ct. 2584 (2015), without the … <Read More>
Attorneys for V.L., the adoptive mother of children born to her former same-sex partner, have asked the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) to review an erroneous decision by the Alabama Supreme Court to refuse to recognize the adoption that was approved by the Georgia Superior Court, and have also asked SCOTUS to restore her visitation rights while the appeal is pending by suspending the Alabama Supreme Court’s order in the case. The petitions were filed on … <Read More>
The Iowa Supreme Court ruled on May 3 that a state law providing that the husband of a married woman who gives birth to a child is the presumptive father is unconstitutional to the extent that it doesn’t also provide such a presumption of parentage for married lesbian couples. Although the court rejected a lower court ruling interpreting the statute to lead to such a result, the court affirmed the lower court using its alternative … <Read More>