+353 (1) 685 6929 Ever since men started marrying, paternity fraud was possible. Initially, the mother of a child deliberately naming a wrong person as child’s father was not taken as seriously as it is nowadays. The decision of such cases was only based upon phenotype characteristics.
Possible reasons of paternity fraud
Today, if a woman falsely claims a man to be the father of her child, he is a victim of paternity fraud. Some might consider this as illogical or think this could never happen. Greed would take over so therefore the first possible reason could be for financial gain. This would be easy for a woman having more than one sexual partner. To gain a large amount of child support, she could easily say that the richest boyfriend she had was the father of her child – or another example would be that, after becoming pregnant by her boyfriend and realizing he wasn’t well off at all, the mother could easily find a rich partner and tell him that he is the father of her child.
Laws in different countries do vary, for instance in the UK paternity fraud is an offence. Surprisingly enough no-one has ever been prosecuted for this crime. The only valid evidence available is DNA testing. The men on several occasions were ordered by the courts to give financial support, even though the DNA test proved that the child was not his. The courts’ decision is always for the benefit of the child.
Paternity fraud is a social evil
The woman blaming a rich man just considers it a child or family protection plan. The court is only interested in the child’s future rather than the father’s rights and emotions. If the husband, of any such woman finds out that he is not the real father of the child, then he is not obliged to help.
The strongest evidence, on which the court’s decision is based, is the woman’s statement. There is no up-to-date data available from any source giving the exact number of such frauds in the world. Usually the child’s paternity is tested along with other testimonials. It is estimated that ten percent of such disputes can be considered as paternity fraud. The most important issue is the sexual relationships proved with the accused man.