Thursday, December 04, 2003

Paternity Fraud: When Men, Women, Technology and The Law Part Ways

Interesting piece in Men's Journal by Paige Williams about Paternity Fraud which puts you front and center in the midst of a hot issue -- how DNA testing is letting men find out if their kids are theirs or NOT.

She profiles a dad who's been paying a hefty chunk of child support to his ex-wife for the benefit of a much-loved daughter, only to find out, you guessed it, the 11-year-old daughter is not his biological daughter.

What I found particularly interesting is that the law has not caught up with technology. The law in most states would not allow a father to STOP paying support even if the technology allows him to prove he is NOT the father of a particular child.

One interesting pull-out quote:
It's said that 10 percent of the U.S. population are not the biological offspring of the men they presume are their fathers.
You may not know much about child support, but start with the hypothetical that you might be a spouse for 2 years, father or mother a child, get divorced and end up paying child support until that 2-year-old is 18, or more likely 21. You pay or you go to jail. As tough as that is, imagine finding out you never were the biological father!