SANTA ANA — The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to review a precedent-setting Orange County case on surrogate motherhood, letting stand a state court ruling that gave genetic parents Mark and Crispina Calvert custody of a child carried to term by another woman.

"We're just overjoyed with the decision," said Mark Calvert, who was joined by his wife and their 3-year-old son, Christopher, at a news conference in their attorney's office. "It's been 3 1/2 years of trial and ordeal and we're just real thankful that our nightmare is over."

"They're a family forever, and nobody's every going to touch (them) again," said attorney Robert Walmsley, who represented the couple in their effort to retain custody of Christopher in the face of a legal challenge by nurse Anna Johnson.

Even before he was born on Sept. 19, 1990, Christopher Calvert became the center of a nationwide debate over the rights of surrogate mothers, a wide-ranging argument that included advocates of banning the practice entirely and those who believe surrogate mothers should have parental rights.

The California Supreme Court set a national precedent when it ruled May 20 that Johnson had no rights to the child she called Matthew. While upholding the surrogacy contract as valid, the court reasoned that custody should go to the Calverts because they supplied the fertilized egg and "intended" to raise the boy.

Monday's victory for the Calverts leaves Johnson still mourning for the little boy she also considered her own, even though she was impregnated with the couple's egg and sperm and has no genetic ties to the child, her attorney said.

Johnson is also still coping with grief stemming from a miscarriage she suffered two days after the state Supreme Court ruling in May, said Richard C. Gilbert, her attorney.

The decision has also left both critics and supporters of surrogacy contracts disappointed that there will be no federal high court ruling on many of the nettlesome issues raised in the case. While the Supreme Court's ruling Monday makes the Calvert-Johnson case the law of the land in California, it will do little to quell the debate over the rights of surrogate mothers, legal experts say.

"No single case or decision could settle an issue when there is such a widespread . . . dispute about reproductive technology and the struggle to determine what is a 'parent,' " said Marjorie Shultz, a professor at the Boalt Hall School of Law at UC Berkeley.