Eager to start a family, Lupita Benitez asked her doctor to help her conceive a child through artificial insemination. Benitez thought her request was routine -- just another of many from women who face infertility and seek medical help to get pregnant.
But Benitez's doctor, Christine Z. Brody, refused to perform the procedure. Her reason: Benitez is a lesbian, and Brody said it was against her Christian beliefs to help a homosexual become pregnant.
After that 1999 appointment in her doctor's office in the San Diego suburb of Vista, Benitez filed a civil rights lawsuit against Brody and the doctor's medical group. The trial court initially dismissed the lawsuit. Now the matter is before the 4th District California Court of Appeal in San Diego.
The case has thrown into confrontation a young woman's claim that she is entitled to be treated equally regardless of her sexual orientation against a doctor's insistence that she should not be forced to provide medical services that conflict with her religious beliefs.
Brody and her medical colleagues won an initial round in court on a technical issue.
Civil Rights Issue
Lawyers for Benitez say she is entitled to equal treatment under the law, just like any citizen; in other words, her lesbianism should not block her from receiving artificial insemination. The lawsuit filed by Benitez against Brody and her medical group contends that doctors, just like other professionals and businesses, are subject to California law that bars discrimination against gays.
A state appellate court is expected to rule within weeks whether to uphold the lower court ruling or, instead, to allow the suit to move ahead and send it back to a lower court for trial.
"Health-care professionals, including doctors, need to understand civil rights laws apply to them," said Jennifer C. Pizer, a lawyer with the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund who is assisting Benitez. Pizer said a doctor's care is a "public accommodation" under the law, which must be accessible to all just like the lunch counters of the South that were finally opened to African Americans.
Claim Called Baseless
Carlo Coppo, an attorney representing Brody, her medical partner Dr. Douglas K. Fenton, their medical group and Benitez's health plan, called Benitez's claim baseless.
Citing rules of patient confidentiality, Coppo said the physicians could not comment on the specifics of Benitez's case. But he agreed that the doctors declined to perform the artificial insemination and instead referred Benitez to another doctor.
