Judge: Divorced couple's frozen embryos must be discarded

Mary Bowerman | USA TODAY Network

A California judge ruled Wednesday that a woman must adhere to an agreement she made with her ex-husband to destroy five frozen embryos if the couple divorced.

Superior Court Judge Anne-Christine Massullo ruled that the embryos must be “thawed and discarded,” according to the court documents.

“It is a disturbing consequence of modern biological technology that the fate of nascent human life, which the embryos in this case represent, must be determined in a court by reference to cold legal principles,” Massullo wrote in the 83-page decision.

Mimi Lee and her ex-husband Stephen Findley froze five embryos in 2010 while the couple was married. The couple signed an agreement that they would destroy the embryos if they divorced, which they did in 2013.

Lee has maintained that cancer made it hard to get pregnant, and the embryos are her only shot at having a child, AP reported. Findley argued that if Lee was successful in using the embryos, she might use the child to get money from him, according to the ruling.

Massullo said the ruling reflected the original intentions of both Lee and Findley. Under California law, those who are seeking fertility treatment are given a consent agreement before treatment specifying what they would like to do in the case of divorce, AP reported.

The embryos were held at the University of California, San Francisco.

The case is similar to Modern Family actress Sofia Vergara’s legal battle with her former fiance over whether he is able to use their frozen embryos without her consent.

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