ORLANDO, FLA. (WSVN) - A Florida couple has reached a custody agreement with the biological parents of a 6-month-old girl following an embryo mixup at a fertility clinic.
According to court documents, Steven Mills and Tiffany Score will keep permanent custody of their daughter, Shea.
The couple, who are white, discovered last year that they weren’t genetically related to Shea after giving birth to her and seeing she is a different ethnicity from them.
“Tiffany underwent a C-section, and it was a very difficult birth, but ultimately it produced a beautiful little girl. A little girl who much to their surprise had a very different appearance from what they had expected. It became very apparent within a short period of time that the child that they had born was not their child,” said Jack Scarola, the family’s attorney.
The fertilization error occurred at an Orlando clinic. Staff at the clinic implanted what they thought was one of the couple’s embryos, but genetic tests confirmed that they were not Shea’s parents.
“Shea is an absolutely beautiful little girl. They fell in love with her,” said Scarola.
Despite the custody agreement already settled, a lawsuit remains ongoing against the fertility clinic and doctor.
In January, the clinic said in a statement: “We will continue to assist in any way that we can, regardless of the outcome of the investigation.”
The other viable embryos created by the couple are currently being tested in a new facility. DNA verification expected in six weeks.
“This remaining embryo, and that is resolved to the point that we now have it. We plan on testing it,” said the couple’s attorney Mara Hatfield.
The identity of Shea’s biological parents remains confidential.
The couple said that while they will raise Shea on their own, they “intend to continue to foster a relationship of friendship and trust” with her biological parents.
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