2023 CNET, a Red Ventures company. This is a big one, and the documentary doesn't provide a definitive answer. At the end, it's revealed that there are at least 94 Cline siblings. Visit our corporate site. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Cond Nast. He lives within just a few blocks of some of the children he fathered without their mothers consent. In 2017, Dr. Cline pleaded guilty to two felony obstruction of justice charges after falsely denying to state investigators that he had been using his own sperm to inseminate patients. Dr. Donald Cline was once a respected fertility doctor from Indianapolis, Indiana. When six of the half-siblings confronted Cline, according to the documentary, he admitted to using his own sperm and said their parents' records were destroyed. 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Several of Cline's children also live in Indianapolis, some within blocks of their biological father. An only child who was donor-conceived, she was always curious about whether she had any half siblings. Did you never consider that?' Cline, who was retired and in his early 80s, was charged with two counts of felony . Todays biggest stories, from pop culture to politicsdelivered straight to your inbox. The healthy baby justified the lie. Glamour may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. The individuals touched by this were very emotional and had a feeling I [was there] to deliver catharsis. Then DNA testing came along", "Biological children of fertility doctor and their mothers bond to fight", "Watch The Exclusive Trailer For 'Our Father,' Netflix's Latest True Crime Doc", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_Cline&oldid=1141633962, People convicted of obstruction of justice, Pages using infobox criminal with known for parameter, Pages containing links to subscription-only content, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Inseminating his own sperm into unwitting patients and fathering 94 doctor-conceived children, Decided; plea guilty, one-year suspended sentence, fine $500; petition for AMS filed and denied. "I was still the same person, but my understanding of my history had flipped upside down.". 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Magazines, Capture a Year of Painand Resiliencein Ukraine, Or create a free account to access more articles. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. Many of the donor-children live within a 25-mile radius of each other. In the film, directed by Lucie Jourdan of "Taken at Birth" fame, Ballard and a handful of her siblings theorize that breeding an all-white brood in an effort to preserve the Caucasian race may have. This is despite the victims interviewed in the documentary saying that they never would've consented to him being the sperm donor, and that they felt violated by what he did. It teases the story of Dr. Donald Cline, a former fertility doctor who used his own sperm in donations, which resulted in his fathering at least 50 children throughout the 1970s and '80s. This page was last edited on 26 February 2023, at 01:14. Dr. Donald Cline Instructed His Patients To Lie to Their Children Netflix's true-crime documentary hinted at a similar trend among Dr. Donald Cline's donor children - their parents had never told them they were conceived through insemination. Cline's jail sentence of 365 days was suspended. Sibling Matt White suggests in the film that someone must have known that Cline was inseminating women with his own sperm. During the 1970s and 80s, a fertility specialist in Indiana named Dr. Donald Cline inseminated dozens of patients with his own sperm, without their knowledge or consent. [5], In 2014 when Jacoba Ballard, a daughter of a former patient of Dr. Cline, reviewed the results of her at-home DNA test, she discovered a biological connection to eight previously unknown half-siblings. The interesting documentary film is bound to raise many questions in the viewer's mind regarding Dr. Donald Cline's religious beliefs and the motives behind his heinous actions. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. Our Father drops on Netflix on May 11. At the time there was no Indiana state or federal law to criminalize Cline's actions, and his victims struggled to get justice. In Our Father, Ballard draws a link between Cline and Quiverfull, but it's not a strong one. And that was it. I think it was some sick experiment for him, one sibling ponders in the trailer. Cline was handed a one-year suspended sentence for the two counts of obstruction of justice, and because state law hadn't specifically prohibited fertility doctors from using their own sperm, no other charges were brought against him. Cline's own auto-immune condition, rheumatoid arthritis, would have excluded him as an eligible sperm donor at his own clinic.[26]. They all shared a father, fertility doctor Donald Cline. "To get away with it for decades and no one knew anything. Our Father suggests Cline may have been motivated by ideology born of his affiliation with an extremist Christian sect called Quiverfull, which encourages followers to reproduce as prolifically as possible to meet Gods mandate to be fruitful and multiply, and install adherents in positions of power. explained in the documentary. In the documentary, Ballard recounts a meeting between Cline and some of the siblings, where Cline apparently explained that he only used his own sperm to help mothers who he thought were desperate for a child, according to Ballard. The film emphasizes how Clines faith, which developed after he accidentally struck and killed a young girl with his car, pervaded his practice as a doctor. 1,794, This story has been shared 1,672 times. Another documentary, HBO's Baby God, tells the story of one of those doctors. I know Im going to call them and Im going to ruin their life, she says in the documentary. Growing up as an only child, Jacoba Ballard desperately wanted siblings. Netflix's new true crime documentary "Our Father" will introduce the world to an . In Our Father, a new Netflix documentary, director Lucie Jourdan interviews many of Cline's biological children, who describe both the trauma of discovering their hidden lineage and the. [a] Her genetic genealogy research ultimately revealed Cline, her mother's fertility doctor, as her biological father. But Ballards lifelong dream of having a big family quickly warped as her half-sibling matches ballooned. But, thanks to a sympathetic judge and a lack of criminal history, he ended up not serving any jail time and simply paying a $500 fine. Despite the victims' and children's ongoing calls for justice, Cline was never charged with rape. Want CNET to notify you of price drops and the latest stories? "Um, my wife and I, uh, after 57 years of marriage, um, we have had a great deal of problems over this. As a result of his crimes, Cline lost his medical license (after he had already retired, in 2009), paid a measly $500 fine, and served a single year of probation. It was a violation of him into me, said Diana Kiesler, whose daughter Julie is Clines biological child. [10] Then Indiana attorney general Tim DeLaney declined to prosecute because "there was no law forbidding Clines conduct. But years later, when a 23andMe match and a DNA test proved that her daughter and Ballard were blood relatives, and the truth of Clines trickery came out, it nearly destroyed Kieslers family. After registering on an online forum for adoptees and donor-conceived children, she found another woman whose mother had been treated by Cline, and she also knew another woman. I just felt bad for my mother, said White. Cline has reportedly since moved on to a different church. (He sent a letter to AG office denying that he used his sperm after the office sent him notification of the investigation that Ballard had initiated.) Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, Ballard was one of the first. The film explores the real-life story of the disgraced doctor, who . Woock says she hopes the documentary will "prompt Cline's former patients to have an open conversation with their children, so they can take DNA tests to confirm their genetic identities. Your California Privacy Rights, Jacoba Ballard desperately wanted siblings Donald Cline inseminating. All shared a father, fertility doctor, who was donor-conceived, she says in the documentary of 's! Actually the one speaking in the film explores the real-life story of one the. 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