LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A Colorado woman is accusing a Kentucky doctor in a lawsuit of using his own sperm during her fertility treatment decades ago without her knowledge.
Susan Crowder, who lives in Longmont, is filing the lawsuit under a new Kentucky law that sets criminal and civil penalties for fertility fraud. Crowder's attorney, Amy Wheatley, said this is the first such suit under the law, which Crowder lobbied for.
The lawsuit was filed against Dr. Marvin Yussman and the University of Louisville, his former employer.
Yussman, now retired, “represented the sperm to be from an anonymous medical student attending the University of Louisville, but in fact, the sperm was from Dr. Yussman himself,” the lawsuit alleged.
The suit was filed Thursday in Jefferson County Circuit Court in Kentucky.
"I feel vindicated to a degree because there are people out there who think this was an awful thing for this man to do to us," Crowder said to 9NEWS sister station WHAS in Louisville, Ky. after the lawsuit was filed. "He was deceitful. He just deprived me of my personal choices that he indicated I would have."
Crowder's daughter, who was born in 1976, took a genetic test three years ago. Crowder filed a complaint with the state board that issues medical licenses, but “was told that there was insufficient evidence" that Yussman violated state law, the suit said.
Crowder then advocated for the passage of Kentucky's Fraudulent Assisted Reproduction Law, which was signed by the governor earlier this year.
A message sent to a UofL spokesman was not returned Thursday afternoon.
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