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| Court: No Inmate Procreation Rights |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 05/27/2002 |
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A California inmate has no right to mail his sperm from prison to impregnate his wife, a divided federal appeals court ruled Thursday. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in reversing its September decision, said inmates have no constitutional right to procreate. Ruling 6-5, the San Francisco-based court put a halt to inmate William Gerber's plans to ship his sperm to his wife in Southern California. 'A holding that the state of California must accommodate Gerber's request to artificially inseminate his wife as a matter of constitutional right would be a radical and unprecedented interpretation of the Constitution,' Judge Barry G. Silverman wrote. Gerber's effort to impregnate his wife got national attention last year when a three-judge panel of the court said Gerber had a right to mail his sperm to his 46-year-old wife, Evelyn. The U.S. Supreme Court has said prisoners have a right to marry and be free from forced sterilization. But neither the high court nor any lower court has resolved circumstances presented in Gerber's case, which reached the courts when the California Department of Corrections balked at Gerber's proposal. 'The close 6-5 decision is obviously very disappointing to the Gerbers, and disturbing to anyone troubled by a government that can dictate who may or may not have children,' said the Gerbers' attorney, Teresa Zuber. Evelyn Gerber declined comment. Judge Alex Kozinski, writing a dissenting opinion, said the process Gerber requested wouldn't compromise security or place a strain on prison resources. He added that the ruling could encourage curtailing prisoners' rights. In a similar case earlier this year, a federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled that a convicted New York mobster's wife couldn't use her husband's sperm to get pregnant because she had broken the law by bribing an officer to smuggle the sperm out of prison. In 1995, California banned conjugal visits for prisoners convicted of sex crimes, crimes carrying life sentences or violent crimes against family members or minors. Gerber, convicted of illegally discharging a firearm and making terrorist threats, was sentenced to life under California's three strikes law. |
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