Another Paternity Fraud case.(30% of Paternity tests prove children fathered by other men.)

Patrick McCarthy was floored to learn after his divorce that his 14-year-old daughter had been fathered by another man. He was even more stunned to find out that he would still have to pay $280 a month in child support.

"You have to be a stone not to react emotionally to something like that," said McCarthy, 41, a delivery service driver from Hillsborough, N.J. "The thing I found more disturbing was the way they treat you in court."

In New Jersey, as in most other states, children born during a marriage are the legal responsibility of the husband - even if he isn't the biological father.

Now some of these "duped dads," as they call themselves, are waging state-by-state battles to institute "paternity fraud" laws. Fueled by anger and raw emotion, they are forming grassroots groups and pressing for the right to use DNA evidence in court to be free of making support payments for children they didn't father.

New Jersey Citizens Against Paternity Fraud, which McCarthy founded, recently paid $50,000 for nine billboards along highways (and other ads) that show a pregnant woman and read "Is It Yours? If Not, You Still Have to Pay!"

"Why does a man who is not the father have to bear the financial responsibility for fraud?" asked New Jersey Assemblyman Neil Cohen (D., Union), who sponsored legislation allowing men to use DNA tests to disprove paternity and end financial support. The bill recently came out of committee and faces a vote from the Assembly.

But women's groups and child advocates are alarmed by a trend that they say could harm children.

"It's not as simple as, 'This isn't fair, I have to pay for somebody else's kid,' " said Valerie Ackerman, staff lawyer at the National Center for Youth Law in Oakland, Calif. "Families are much more than biology."

It is not known how many men would try to disprove paternity in court, even if they could. An American Association of Blood Bank survey in 2000 of 30,626 paternity tests showed that 30 percent of those taking the tests were not the real fathers.

What is clear is that the law is not on their side. Most states require nonbiological fathers to keep paying child support even if they were deceived by their spouses, based on the 500-year-old legal presumption that any child born during a marriage is the husband's.

For unmarried fathers, if the paternity is not challenged at birth, they generally do not get a second chance to raise the issue.

But more and more states are reshaping these laws. Men have won the right by legislation or case law to use genetic testing to disprove paternity in 12 states. Three more, including New Jersey, have pending legislation that let nonbiological fathers off the hook.

Since 1999, Pennsylvania lawmakers twice turned down similar legislation, introduced after a Reading man, Gerald Miscovich, sought relief from the $537 a month he was paying for a child who was not his. He lost the case and ended all contact with the then-4-year-old boy. Sen. Michael A. O'Pake (D., Reading) plans to reintroduce the bill next month.

Carnell Smith of Decatur, Ga., is one of two men who appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court after lower courts ruled against them. Smith is trying to recoup more than $40,000 from his ex-girlfriend after learning three years ago that her 13-year-old girl is not his. But the Supreme Court declined to hear his case, meaning he must continue to pay $750 a month in child support.

"It's not a gender war from my perspective. It's about truth," said Smith, who founded U.S. Citizens Against Paternity Fraud. His group - whose slogan is "If the genes don't fit, you must acquit" - lobbied for the law that Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes signed in May.

Others have not been swayed. In October, California Gov. Gray Davis vetoed a paternity fraud bill, saying the measure would only delay child support collection and let some biological fathers wriggle out of parental responsibility.

Child advocates agree. They worry that children will be traumatized by losing the emotional and financial support of the person they know as "Dad."

"I would think if there's a close parent-child relationship, then the matter of whose DNA the child is carrying wouldn't matter that much," said Laura Morgan, chairwoman of the American Bar Association's Child Support Committee. "It's too easily reducing parentage to dollars and DNA."

In many cases, a man suspects a child is not his and chooses to raise the child anyway, said Paula Roberts, a lawyer at the Center for Law and Social Policy in Washington. But after a divorce "he has a new wife and she's saying, 'Why are we paying for this kid?' Now he wants out," she said.

"What kind of damage have we done to the kids if the person they know as their father wants out?"

Some of the new statutes give fathers two years to contest paternity. Men say such deadlines are unfair because women can sue to establish paternity at any time in a child's life.

But Ackerman, with the youth law center, said "you give a person unlimited time to establish paternity, it leaves a child in limbo their entire lives."

Those pressing for the new laws say they do not anticipate wide-scale child abandonment. Cohen, a lawyer who has represented both men and women in these types of cases, said that "when [fathers] have a relationship with their son or daughter, they don't necessarily walk away from the child. They just don't want to have the financial responsibility."

But he has also seen men who were "so angry and upset over being lied to, they walk away," he said.

These non-dads, who network via e-mail and compare hard-luck stories, say the issue goes beyond monthly child support checks.

"To not allow DNA testing is not allowing the truth to come forward," said McCarthy, who would like to see every child's DNA tested at birth to prevent mix-ups. "My contention is every child has a right to know who their biological parents are."

Even though McCarthy's daughter looked nothing like him, he never suspected she was not his until his ex-wife blurted it out during an argument, he said. He used a home DNA kit and a cheek swab to confirm there was virtually no chance the girl was his.

With no legal standing, he continued supporting her and began lobbying for a change in the law. Though their relationship is strained, the girl, now 19, still calls him "Dad," said McCarthy, who lives with his second wife and their two children.

What really galls these men "is the fact that you have to pay support to an ex-wife who lied to you and deceived you," McCarthy said. (Like some other men in the movement, he declined to provide information about his ex-wife.)

One man who would greatly benefit from the new laws is Morgan Wise, of Big Spring, Texas. A train engineer, he was married for 13 years to a woman who had four children. The youngest had cystic fibrosis. After he divorced in 1996, he said, he took a test to see which cystic fibrosis gene he carried.

No such gene was found. DNA testing showed that three of the four children were not his.

His wife, Wanda Scroggins, said that he knew "there was a possibility" the children weren't his. She said they both had affairs during their marriage and he agreed to raise the children as his own.

They also agreed to keep the truth to themselves, but Wise told the children one day while they were at school. It cost him visitation rights for two years.

In another blow, a Texas court ruled that he still had to pay $1,100 a month in child support. In January, the U.S Supreme Court refused to hear his appeal.

Recently, Wise began spending time again with the children, but the relationship is rocky.

"If it's your kid, no matter who the biological father is, how does that matter?" Scroggins asked. "He was there when they were born, he changed their diapers, saw their first steps, kissed their boo-boos. How do you just stop that?"

It seems hard to believe, but over and over again, when paterity tests are made, it is consistently 30%, whether married or not.

Stunning, isn't it?

Thirty percent! I think that is amazing. DNA testing should be part of every birth, period. If a few women get caught setting up a man with more money than the one who knocked her up, so what.

Thirty percent, means that this is a pretty rampant and regular practice among SOME women. Men AND women need to be protected from this form of fraud.

Oh, Nonsense.

Children need to know who their parents are for health reasons. It is only like saying that parents need to tell the truth.

You cant lie on a Drivers' Licence application without it being a felony, but you can lie on a Birth Certificate and get a bonue?

Give me a break.

Of course it should be a felony for lying on a birth certificate. Don't twist my words.

If the father wants to request a DNA test, he should be granted one. It should not be mandatory. In this country, you are innocent until proven guilty. If a man has suspicion, or just wants a DNA test for reassurance, he should have one. Women should not be forced to have a DNA test by law, that's all I am saying.

I read your reply about your personal experience with the subject and have to say I have never been in your shoes. But to say that mandatory testing would make all women feel like sluts I think is wrong too. I think it would cause a stronger bond immediatly in the family.

Hi BB, good to see you're keeping up with your cause.

I see your point, but strong bonds are built on trust. To make DNA tests mandatory is eliminating that trust. See my above post. If a man wants a DNA test, fine. He should be entitled to one. But I feel that it is wrong to require DNA tests by law.

I see your point, but strong bonds are built on trust. To make DNA tests mandatory is eliminating that trust.

If they were mandatory, everyone would be doing it and it would not be eliminating trust. It would be strengthening the law, mainly for paternity cases. It may make some women a bit more responsible. It would virtually eliminate the problem of children finding out by mom later in life that she lied to them. That's got to be a tough pill to swallow.

Guilt or innocence is not the point. When a child is born, BOTH parents have a right to know if or if not they are the biological parent.

It doesnt matter though, because although you dont agree, this is going to happen. There will be mandatory testing, and probably because WOMEN will demand it, after discovering that men are not going to marry them otherwise.

Yeah, you're right, that must be a tough pill to swallow. And I do sympathize with the people that happens to. I just think that mandatory testing isn't right. Personally, I don't think it would ever become a law, anyway. The cost alone would be astronomical--and who would pick up the tab? However, I do believe that if people need one for peace of mind, that is fine.

Headed to bed for now....have a Happy New Year!:)

Maybe you are right, but I doubt it. Men will still marry women whether there is a DNA test or not, women don't always care to get married, and some partners are true to each other. There are a lot of dynamics involved in a relationship. And women aren't always the cheaters, as I well know:)

That's what you risk when you marry a girl that is willing to sleep with you before marriage.

Yeah. Buyer beware. Just like purchasing property, do your homework, have her inspected and check her title. Once you close the deal all the defects belong to you.

In California a man can be named the father of a child, have a letter sent to any address and without a DNA test be legally named as the father. Even after he proves he is not bio-dad the state still makes him paid.

A quick search in any search engine will give source after source on this fact. Even the liberal LA Times picked up on the story.

Mandatory DNA testing would prevent hundreds of men from being falsely accused and then forced to pay support for years for a child that isn't theirs. Remember also, a person in prison can use DNA tests to prove their innocence, why do we give "fathers" less rights then convicted criminals?

"Good point, but it does take two to tango...:"

While it takes two to tango, only 1 out of 3 have any rights after the fact.

1. A woman can have an abortion when she does not want a child to interfeer with her life. A man can not walk away or stop a woman from having an abortion even if he is willing to take on the responsibility of the child.

2. A woman can name a man as the father of her child and in some state, that word is taken as fact, without benefit of a DNA test. Later on, if the "father" proves he is not bio-dad, too late, too bad. (see Calfornia for this)

3. According to the US Census that tracks child support payments, women are more likely to default on child support payments and are less likely to even be ordered to pay support then men. When was the last time you heard the media refer to "deadbeat moms".

I can go on and on about the unfairness of child custody, support payments, lack of DNA testing, "duped dads" etc. It all boils down to one fact, we have allowed the legal profession to destroy the family, encouraged bad behavior by women, encouraged single motherhood and made marriage in this society trivial. We are all paying for this.

The law is simple, womens' rights and mens' responsibilities".

Yup,that pretty much sums it up. No way are the courts going to tell the women to be responsible for THEIR mistakes.

Having said that,I think these guys are following the wrong tactics. They would probably do better if they were to sue their ex-wives for emotional distress and suffering. You don't have to be King Solomon to see what it would do to you to find out the teenage child you have loved and cared for all their lives weren't your children.

There's no difference between being unfaithful to a current husband and being unfaithful to a future husband except the nature of the excuse.

Maybe not on your home planet,but here on Earth things are different.

New wives seem to expect the old children to be forgoteen.

That's because American women see two types of money in a relationship with a man. There is their money,and there is OUR money.

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