SALT LAKE CITY—The University of Utah is investigating a complaint that a convicted felon working at a fertility clinic replaced a customer’s sperm with his own, fathering a girl 21 years ago.
The mother of the girl, Pamela Branum, says she and her husband discovered a genetic mismatch in their daughter, and were able to trace her lineage with help from relatives of the now-deceased fertility clinic worker, Thomas Ray Lippert.
“I don’t think we’re the only ones,” Branum told CBS affiliate KUTV in Salt Lake City. “We think we’re one of many” victims who used a clinic that was operated by faculty members.
The University of Utah says there is “credible” evidence of semen tampering or mislabeling. On Friday, the university announced it was opening a hotline and offering paternity testing to anyone who used the clinic between 1988 and 1993.
“It was hard at first, to think, ‘Who am I?’” the daughter told KUTV in San Antonio, where the family moved in 2003. “I thought I was this person [of] my mom and my dad. Now, my dad is not my biological father. Who am I?”
In a statement that stopped short of taking responsibility or naming Lippert, the University of Utah Health Care system says it appears Branum’s daughter was fathered by a clinic employee. The university says there are no remaining records from the Reproductive Medical Technologies clinic to prove the family’s claim, or any evidence of other cases.
Kathy Wilets, a spokeswoman for the university’s Health Sciences division, said she could not answer a series of questions submitted by The Associated Press in writing. She declined comment on what officials have learned since opening the investigation in April 2013.
