Artificial Insemination

More than four years after her 20-year-old soldier son was killed in the Gaza Strip, Rachel Cohen is hoping for a grandchild after winning a court case to have a woman inseminated with his sperm. The case, decided this month by a court near Tel Aviv, is the first in the world in which a court permitted a woman to be inseminated with sperm from a known, dead donor who was not her partner, said the lawyer who argued the case, Irit Rosenblum. Staff Sgt.

Israel's Supreme Court ruled that the assassin of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin should be allowed to father children through artificial insemination. Yigal Amir and his wife had petitioned the court for the right to bear children. Amir, serving a life sentence without parole for the 1995 assassination, married Larissa Trimbobler by proxy in 2004; the prison service does not allow them conjugal visits.

The state Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to hear a lawsuit by a lesbian against two fertility doctors who refused to artificially inseminate her on religious grounds. Without comment, the court said it will hear the appeal by attorneys for Guadalupe T. Benitez, 34, of Oceanside in her lawsuit against Vista-based North Coast Women's Care Medical Group and Dr. Christine Brody and Dr. Douglas Fenton.

Australian scientists on Monday unveiled three baby koalas produced with new artificial insemination technology designed to ensure the species' survival. The breeding techniques involve mixing sperm with a solution that prolongs its shelf life. About 25 koalas have been produced by artificial insemination with a success rate approaching that of natural mating.

A state appeals court ruled Friday that two fertility doctors had the right to refuse to artificially inseminate a lesbian based on her marital status because it would have violated their religious beliefs. The ruling reversed a lower court decision that Drs. Christine Brody and Douglas Fenton could not use religion as a defense against a lawsuit filed by Guadalupe T. Benitez, 33.

After Bruce Vernoff died, his grieving widow -- with thoughts of a baby someday -- had sperm removed from his body and frozen. Four years later, Gaby Vernoff gave birth to a daughter with no father -- at least under the law. To government officials in California, Bruce Vernoff never existed as a parent because he was dead long before his daughter was conceived. Now some tricky legal issues highlighted by the Vernoff situation are being considered in the California Legislature.

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.

A state appellate court ruled Tuesday that a woman has the right to sue her doctor for refusing to help her conceive a child through artificial insemination. Lupita Benitez, a lesbian, plans to proceed with her civil rights suit against the doctor, who said it was against her Christian beliefs to help a homosexual become pregnant. The 4th District Court of Appeal overturned the trial court, which originally dismissed Benitez's lawsuit against Christine Z. Brody and her medical group.

Veterinarians at SeaWorld have, for the first time, produced two bottlenose dolphins by using once-frozen sperm to artificially inseminate their mothers. Officials at the theme park announced Thursday that the two calves, one male and one female, had been born in May to bottlenose dolphins who had been impregnated with sperm from a dolphin used by the U.S. Navy. Previously, bottlenose dolphins have been bred through artificial insemination with fresh semen.

Junko Ito's mother-in-law decided that it was time for her son to get a divorce, and she broke the news to Ito with an old Japanese proverb: "A woman barren after three years of marriage should leave." Her husband did not defend her against his heir-obsessed parents, so she left. Now 37 and remarried, Ito is at last expecting a child, conceived through in vitro fertilization.