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Image via Wikipedia An unrelated woman can seek custody rights over an unadopted child if the petitioner once acted as co-parent during a lesbian relationship with the mother, Nebraska ’s high court has ruled. The ruling, issued on Friday, deflected to a lower court the custody dispute between Teri Latham and Susan Schwerdtfeger of Omaha , the latter of whom underwent in vitro fertilization , leading to the birth of a baby boy in January 2001. The couple, who had been together since 1985, split five years later. Latham is arguing that, because she shared the cost in vitro fertilization and continued to make efforts to visit the boy after the split, she should be granted visitation rights . Schwerdtferger argues that Latham did not pay to help support the child, and that the child no longer wishes to have a relationship with Latham. Last year, a district court for Douglas County allowed telephonic visits by Latham, but after hearing further arguments and interviewing Schwerdtfeger’s ...

Image via Wikipedia In a case that is reminiscent of the now-famous  Lisa Miller  case, a biological mother has retained the sole custody of her daughter after a court ruled in her favor in a dispute with her former same- sex partner . The Supreme Court of Ohio upheld lower court rulings on Tuesday that Kelly Mullen, who had allowed her same-sex partner, Michele Hobbs, to “coparent” Mullen’s daughter, who was born via in vitro fertilization while the two women were in a relationship, did not permanently give up her right to exclusive custody of the child.  The court  ruled  that it was a revocable relationship and did not create a permanent shared custody agreement with the partner. “‘ Coparenting ’ is not synonymous with an agreement by the biological parent to permanently relinquish sole custody in favor of shared legal parenting,” the ruling stated, thereby recognizing the need to protect the biological mother’s constitutional rights to raise her chil...