Lawyers want to ask more questions of a now-retired Vermont fertility doctor they say used his own sperm to impregnate their client four decades ago, now that they claim they found new evidence he may have done it another time with another woman.
That new evidence came to light as a result of a newspaper ad taken out this summer by the daughter, now in her 40s, of Cheryl and Peter Rousseau, the couple who over two years ago filed a federal lawsuit in Burlington against the doctor, John Boyd Coates III.
“In Search of DNA Brothers and Sisters,” the ad from the Valley Reporter in Waitsfield reads in bold letters. The ad sought out people who were born through Coates’ offices between 1976 and 2009, which included locations in Berlin and Burlington.
“Children would have been born,” according to the ad, “with the assistance of artificial insemination or possible in-vitro fertilization and assisted implantation and might not know if they were donor-conceived and at present would be from age 58 to as low as age 12.”
The pending lawsuit accuses Coates of fraud — using his own sperm when Cheryl Rousseau went to him for fertility treatments over 40 years ago, and then not telling the couple that’s what he did.
Attorneys for the couple have already deposed Coates once and he denied using his own sperm to impregnate a patient.
Attorneys Celeste E. Laramie and Jerry O’Neill, representing the Rousseaus, wrote in a recent filing that they are seeking the court’s permission to conduct a second deposition with Coates because the Rousseaus recently became aware — through the newspaper ad — of another instance that closely mirrors their allegations.
Genetic testing on another woman, identified in a court filing only by the initials “M.M.” of Montpelier, shows there is a 92.3% chance that she is a half-sister to the Rousseaus’ daughter.
The Rousseaus’ attorneys allege that another woman, identified by the initials “S.B.,” is “M.M.’s” mother and that she was a patient of Coates for artificial insemination. “S.B.” saw the doctor for three to four years in an effort to become pregnant and ultimately became pregnant following one of the insemination procedures, the filing stated.
Coates told “S.B.” the sperm donor was an anonymous medical student with physical characteristics similar to her and her then-husband, the lawyers allege. He gave the same information to the Rousseaus, according to the lawsuit.
In his deposition, Coates denied using his own semen to impregnate a patient, and also denied ever using a medical student as a donor, the lawyers allege. Instead, according to the filing, Coates testified that he used a “revolving” group of five people he knew.
But the Rousseaus’ lawsuit stated that, when the couple’s daughter used Ancestry.com and 23andme.com seeking information about her biological father, the results traced back to Coates as the donor.
A court-ordered DNA test of Coates in the case has been kept private, again by court order.
The request to question Coates a second time was filed last week.
“This newly discovered information not only is relevant to the case, it is necessary,” the filing stated. “If defendant Coates testifies truthfully at a supplemental deposition, he is virtually certain to admit to impregnating S.B. with his own semen, thereby impeaching his own deposition testimony.”
Peter Joslin, an attorney for Coates, did not immediately return a call Wednesday seeking comment.
O’Neill, an attorney for the Rousseaus, said Wednesday the next step in the case is for Judge Williams K. Sessions III to decide whether Coates can be deposed a second time.
O’Neill added that his office does not represent “S.B” or “M.M.”
“It would be a conflict for us to do so,” he said.
