A COUPLE ARE facing child abduction charges in Thailand after the surrogate mother of their child discovered they were gay.
Gordan ‘Bud’ Lake is the biological father of Carmen, who was born to a surrogate mother, and had travelled to Thailand with his partner Manuel to meet the woman and their child.
However, the woman reneged on her decision to hand the baby over, despite signing consent forms.
Giving an update on their situation to The Anton Savage Show on Today FM, Lake explained that under Thai law he currently has no legal rights to the child.
“The problems started on January 27th, it was the day before we were due to meet in the American Embassy to do the passport paperwork, and I got a [text message] from the surrogate’s translator saying that she wanted to keep the baby,” he explained, but the woman didn’t say why.
It was probably the first time in my life that I went into physical shock. It’s the worst nightmare of anyone anywhere doing surrogacy. It wasn’t expected because it has never happened in Thailand.
The surrogate mother had refused to sign papers for the child to allow her to leave the country when she discovered Lake and his spouse weren’t a “ordinary family”.
“She thought she was doing this for an ordinary couple,” Lake continued, “She was fine doing it for an ordinary couple.”
She commented later on in the press that two men couldn’t provide for a child.
Under Thai law, Lake currently doesn’t have any rights to Carmen, but the couple haven’t fully explored the legalities behind the surrogacy contracts signed.
“We do not think she is trying to renegotiate the contract and ask for more money.”
They are currently living in a secret location in Bangkok.
“She has pressed child abduction charges against me, and I’ve been to see the police. We’re waiting to see what happens on that front.”
We’re devastated. Our family are missing very important months of both our children’s lives. We had a great support network of others parents that were here because of surrogacy and have now left. Now we’re quite lonely, but we have our children to brighten up our days, as you can hear.
“We are just trying to put one foot in front of the other and we’re going to be here and we are going to do what we need to do until we find a solution to bring her daughter home.”
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