EXCLUSIVE My live-in boyfriend of 18 months tragically died in his sleep. I launched a lawsuit to harvest his sperm - these are the eye-opening details
A woman has won a legal bid to have sperm extracted from her dead de-facto partner for IVF treatment and will travel interstate for the procedure because of a bizarre rule.
Stevii Griffin launched a lawsuit in the NSW Supreme Court on March 10 seeking to have a sperm sample extracted from her boyfriend Brodie Davidson.
Mr Davidson died in his sleep two days earlier on March 8 after the pair had been in a de-facto relationship since about August 2023.
Ms Griffin told the court they had often spoken about having a family and submitted a text from Mr Davidson to back up her claim.
Mr Davidson's mother also supported Ms Griffin's application.
Justice Mark Richmond agreed Ms Griffin was entitled to possession of Mr Davidson's sperm and made orders for a sample to extracted from his body.
He authorised Dr Derek Lok from Connect IVF to visit Lidcombe morgue, in western Sydney, and retrieve and store the sperm.
Medical experts recommend that sperm be extracted from a deceased man's body no later than 24 hours after death, but there are reports of live sperm being obtained as late as 48 hours after death.
A month after the sperm was obtained, Ms Griffin was advised by the fertility clinic Queensland Fertility Group (QFG) that it would be happy to receive the sperm and use it in an IVF treatment.
She decided to transport the sample to Queensland for IVF on the basis that NSW wouldn't allow the treatment because Ms Griffin didn't have the written consent of the deceased.
In Queensland, however, written consent is not required for posthumous semination.
In May, Ms Griffin filed an amended summons in court seeking the release of the sample so she could transport it to Queensland.
Justice Richmond concluded in his decision he was 'satisfied that it is appropriate that the Court make orders permitting the plaintiff to transfer the tissue sample to Queensland for its proposed use there in her IVF treatment'.
He noted that without his orders in March, the storage of the sample at Connect IVF would have been unlawful.
NSW law permits the extraction of the sperm without the written consent of the provider, but not its storage, which the judge described as 'odd'.
Applications like Ms Griffin's were generally made 'in circumstances of extreme urgency'.
He also noted that although the law required written consent for such sperm samples to be used for IVF in NSW, there was no prohibition on transporting samples to a jurisdiction that didn't require written consent.
Justice Richmond said in circumstances where the death of the sperm provider was unforeseen, urgent applications like the one made by Ms Griffin in March were 'unsurprising and can be expected to recur'.
He described the apparent conflict in NSW law as an important issue, and said it would be 'desirable' for NSW Parliament to amend the legislation.
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