A Virginia judge has determined that human embryos are not property that can be divided up, and dismissed a lawsuit filed by a woman against her ex-husband over their two frozen embryos.
Honeyhline Heidemann sued Jason Heidemann over access to the embryos they froze during a 2015 cycle of in vitro fertilization (IVF) and then agreed to leave frozen during their divorce three years later. After the divorce, Honeyhline said that the embryos were her last chance to conceive another biological child following treatment for cancer, but Jason argued that he does not want to become a father by force even if he isn’t required to be an active parent. The problem for him is — he already is the father of those two embryos.
The former couple already took part in the procreation of these children of their own free will. Biologically, human embryos are already conceived human beings. The couple has one daughter who was born after being conceived during the same IVF cycle.
In a 2023 ruling on the case, Judge Richard E. Gardiner — who is reportedly no longer on the case — stated that embryos can be considered “goods or chattels” based on laws that governed the treatment of slaves in the state.
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Judge Gardiner previously ruled, “As there is no prohibition on the sale of human embryos, they may be valued and sold, and thus may be considered ‘goods or chattels.'” But his ruling was not final, and now that he is off the case, Fairfax Circuit Judge Dontaè L. Bugg has issued his own opinion, dismissing the lawsuit.
Bugg wrote that Virginia lawmakers have removed references to slavery from state law to “excise a lawless blight from the Virginia code, the institution of slavery applicable to fellow citizens, which removal supports that human beings, and by extension embryos they have created, should not as a matter of legislative policy be subject to partition.”
He also wrote, “… [The] embryos are as unique as any two people that may be selected from the population, including siblings with the same biological parents.”
