A disgraced fertility doctor has fathered 94 children and counting by impregnating his patients with his own sperm.
Netflix documentary Our Father uncovers the sick true story of Dr Donald Cline, who was exposed for inseminating his patients without their knowledge or consent at his fertility practice in Indianapolis in the 1970s and 1980s.
His disgusting crimes were first discovered by his biological daughter, Jacoba Ballard, who was an only child and conceived via donor sperm.
After taking an at-home DNA test, she found she had seven half-siblings – a number that defied best practices in fertility medicine.
As the group set out to learn more about their curious family tree, they soon discovered the sickening truth: Their parents’ fertility doctor had been inseminating his patients with his own sperm.
Speaking in the documentary, Jacoba recalls the moment she learned that her parents’ fertility doctor was her biological father.
‘I was in shock,’ she admits. ‘There were so many emotions, so many questions. He lied about a donor being used. Why did he do it? How long did he do it, and how many siblings do we have?’
Matt White, who also learned he was one of Dr Cline’s children, described the discovery as ‘so f*cked up’.
‘I just felt bad for my mother,’ he says. ‘Here she was, a young woman who just wanted to have a family, like anyone else. It’s a sick individual who puts themselves in that position to be able to do that.’
‘When Matt’s DNA test came back, my first words were “I was raped 15 times and I didn’t even know it”,’ his mother Liz White said.
Recalling her fertility treatment with Dr Cline, she claimed that he was ‘always the only one in the office’.
‘As Cline was closing the door and I was undressing and getting into the stirrups, getting ready for him to bring the donor’s sperm, he was in some other place in the office ejaculating. And not only creating the erection, but he has to go full force in a sexual manner to create that ejaculation.
‘To me, that has always remained a very sad part and disgusting that he was placing his semen into a syringe and he was going to place that syringe at the base of my cervix.’
Cline was taken to court, however, despite inseminating countless women with his own sperm, he had not violated criminal law at the time and only received a $500 (£400) fine for obstructing justice by denying the allegations
In 2018, the mothers and siblings successfully passed legislation in Indiana making illicit donor inseminations illegal, however there is currently no federal law.
Thanks to at-home DNA testing, 44 additional doctors have been found to have used their own sperm to inseminate fertility patients.
Cline is currently the most prolific of these doctors
Our Father arrives on Wednesday, May 11 on Netflix.
