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Surrogate mom, biological dad battle over triplets

CORRY, Pa. - The first week of their lives, the triplets were known only as A, B and C.

Danielle Bimber had no names for the boys because she never intended to be their mother. But leaving the hospital without them, her job seemingly done, the surrogate mom grew uneasy.

Where was the couple who had hired her? When would they come to the hospital to take the newborns home? Why had they stopped visiting after the first day?

After several sleepless nights, and with the hospital preparing to put the children in foster care, Bimber obtained permission to take the boys home to join her two sons, ages 9 and 7, from a previous marriage, and her 4-year-old daughter with Doug Bimber, a self-employed appliance repairman.

And seven days after they were born, A, B and C became Matthew, Mark and Micah.

The Bimbers soon would become embroiled in a bitter battle with the triplets' biological father. The 63-year-old math professor said complicated paperwork was partly to blame for his early absence. He said the Bimbers couldn't provide for the kids as well as he could. At his age, he said, he wanted to "leave something behind when I die."

Fourteen months would elapse before the dispute was settled, leaving one couple disappointed and the other exhausted.

And even today, legal and financial challenges remain in a case that touched on issues of money and class and the lifestyle the children could expect from two different families of vastly different means.

Danielle Bimber, now 30, has lived in this former railroad town about 30 miles southeast of Erie all her life. After graduating from high school in 1992 and attending one year of college, she held minimum-wage jobs at a bank, a gas station and a fitness center.

But she says the job she's most cut out for is being a mom.

Bimber says she decided to become a surrogate mother when a friend had problems getting pregnant.

She didn't do it for the money, she says, though the $24,000 surrogacy fee was sure to come in handy. Four months before the delivery, Bimber filed for bankruptcy, burdened by debt from her first marriage. On their 2003 tax return the Bimbers would report income of $11,400, well below the poverty line for a family of five.

Danielle Bimber arranged to become a surrogate through Surrogate Mothers Inc., of Monrovia, Ind., an agency she found on the Internet.

The firm connected Bimber with an egg donor from Texas and the intended parents: James O. Flynn, now the head of Cleveland State University's Department of Operations Management and Business Statistics, and Eileen Donich, a 60-year-old retired dentist and Flynn's girlfriend.

Bimber met with Flynn once and Donich twice before agreeing to be their surrogate. She said the couple didn't seem bothered by the prospects of triplets. The news didn't elicit much reaction of any kind.

Flynn and Donich have defended their actions in the days after the birth - and before.

The couple met in 1996. Flynn never had kids; Donich was a police officer's widow and mother of two grown children. They did not marry, according to court documents, because they had come to rely on the pension she received.

Flynn said he took a higher-paying job as department head and built a 6,000-square-foot home in the affluent Ohio community of Kirtland to accommodate his new family.

Flynn declined to be interviewed. But in court testimony, the couple said paperwork issues, insurance problems and preparations for the newborns had delayed their return to the hospital.

Donich, meanwhile, said she contacted the hospital every day.

Hospital personnel, however, sided with the Bimbers. They said the professor and Donich inquired about insurance coverage and equipment they might need but not about the newborns, and didn't seem committed to taking the steps to take them home.

Sent home from the hospital three days after her caesarean section Nov. 19, 2003, Bimber made daily checks with the surrogacy agency and with Donich.

"I expected them to get to the hospital and never leave," Bimber said. "Never in a million years would I have ever thought that they would have just not come."

So when Bimber got approval from the hospital attorney to bring the children home Nov. 25, she was totally unprepared. As a friend drove her to the hospital, she called her husband to tell him the news.

"I had no plans, I had no room, I had no crib," Bimber said. "I had nothing."

Hamot Medical Center in Erie gave her diapers, bottles and other baby supplies; the infants would share her daughter's old crib for two months.

Like most states, Pennsylvania has no surrogacy law. The triplets' fate would be in the hands of a judge.

In testimony, Flynn characterized Corry as an economically depressed city with few amenities and a poor school system, and described the Bimbers' home as small and dirty. He said the Bimbers let their kids watch too much TV, questioned the emphasis they put on education and accused the couple of making poor medical decisions.

By comparison, Flynn said he earned $136,000 a year and has a biological connection to the children.

"We can do a better job in taking care of them. We can spend more time with them than other people - than Danielle can do," he said. "We can do a better job educating them and do a better job in taking care of their medical needs."

First, Erie County Judge Shad Connelly gave the Bimbers temporary custody of the children in May 2004 after invalidating the surrogacy contract. He said it failed to name a legal mother for the triplets. Then, in January, the judge came down on the side of Danielle Bimber, giving her permanent custody and saying she was "the better caretaker by far."

"Throughout the custody trial," the judge wrote, "plaintiff alternated between complaining about the amount of money he has spent in legal costs and boasting about the affluent neighborhood and schools of his alleged home in Kirtland, Ohio."

The judge ordered Flynn to pay $1,750 a month for child support and gave him weekend visitation rights; the children were given his last name. Flynn in February notified the court he intends to appeal.

The surrogacy agency has supported Danielle Bimber. They say what happened was a case of failed parenting, not failed surrogacy.

But the complications inherent in surrogate births remain. A Pennsylvania state senator has proposed a bill requiring court approval of surrogacy contracts, counseling for surrogates and intended parents, and hospital protocols for dealing with surrogate births.

Bimber says she has found it nearly unbearable to hear her family portrayed as unfit; her husband worries about the legal bills. The drawn-out dispute has been more difficult than the actual work of caring for three toddlers, a preschooler and two school-age kids, she said.

At lunchtime on a recent day, the triplets tussled over a place on her lap as Bimber juggled sippy cups and highchair trays. Her husband takes breaks during his work day to drive their daughter to preschool, and friends and family also occasionally drop by to give a hand.

"I do get stressed out, don't get me wrong. There's lots of times I've cried and cried and cried and called my attorney stressed out," Bimber said. "And then I look at these kids and they're worth it and I know I did the right thing."

[Last modified May 1, 2005, 00:00:10]