Research Paper on Paternity Fraud: Millions at Risk of Supporting Non-Biological Kids

Introduction

Paternity fraud happens when a mother of a child names a man to be the father of the child when the mother knows that or is suspicious that the man she names is not the biological father of the child. Because the law does not give a room for the mother to advise the court when another man could potentially be the father, millions of men are taking the support of children who are not their biological children. In the legal circles, the deception has come to be known as child paternity fraud.

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In the child paternity fraud, there are three primary victims - the biological father of the child, the child, and the man falsely identified as the father of the child (Jacobs 2004). Misattribution of the identity of a child can be heart wrecking for men who have spent years believing they have biological ties with a child, only to come later to know they have no natural links with a child.

There are two ways in which paternity fraud happens. First, when a man is asked to sign a birth certificate as an affidavit of paternity for a child whom the woman knows the man does not share any biological ties. The case becomes complicated when their state uses the birth certificate as proof of paternity instead of ordering a DNA test. Secondly, paternity fraud happens in some countries through a process known as the presumption of paternity. Here the father is designated to be the biological father of the child because, at the time of child conception, he and the mother were married. Thus the man is supposed to pay the support of the child long after the designation of paternity is clear.

Why Paternity Fraud should Be Criminalized

There are several reasons why paternity fraud should be criminalized. The most key among them is that paternal fraud makes a child not to know their real biological parents. Hence, denying them an opportunity to truly have a genuine sense of identity they could rely on for the long haul, without any risk of a potential breakdown in the future. Paternal fraud makes a child rely on a paternal identity that is subject to future breakdown, which comes with emotional turmoil for the child.

Additionally, paternal fraud should be criminalized because of the emotional pain it brings to the victim, the man who is falsely accused. Men suffer emotional pain, which comes with great stress and depression. Depression has many negative effects on well-being including the risk of heart problems, weight fluctuations, and a decline in productivity. There have even been cases where emotional depression has eventually ended in the demise of the victims. Therefore to stop potential ills linked to paternal fraud, a state should make laws that make it illegal and criminal for anyone to be involved in the act of lying about the paternity of their children.

Furthermore, in some extreme instances, paternal fraud makes victimized men commit other crimes. Some victims of paternal fraud take the law into their hands and harm mothers who dupe them, upon discovery that they were lied to on the child paternity. To stop instances of violence resulting from paternal frauds, a country should make laws that stop mothers from lying about their children's paternity in the first place. In the United States, such laws can be developed at the state level but they should be harmonized for certain minimum requirements.

Measures to Control Paternity Fraud

To curb the increase of instances where many mothers are lying about the paternity identities of their children, states should criminalize the act of paternity fraud. It should be made illegal for mothers to lie about the paternity ties of their children. Where a mother gives a wrong paternity identity of a child knowingly, the law should provide penalties such as fines. The law should provide that the amount the woman is fined for the offense is commensurate with the number of years the father would have taken care of the child's support. Further, the entire fine amount should be given to the misattributed father of the child as a reimbursement for the resources they would have spent in support of the child.

Also, the law should criminalize paternity fraud by providing for an imprisonment penalty for mothers who lie about the paternity ties of their children. The period of imprisonment should be in line with whether the woman lied about a child knowingly as a way of getting resources from a man or not. For a mother who would lie to get supplies from a man, the period of imprisonment should be longer compared to that of a mother who would lie innocently. By criminalizing the offense of paternity fraud, a country would be able to reduce the cases of paternity fraud, and further, the victims would be saved from the experiences of resource loss and emotional torture.

Alternatively, as a final solution to paternity fraud, there should be laws in our country enforcing mandatory paternity tests at birth. The identification of paternity ties of a child at birth would help men who would possibly be victims of paternity fraud save their resources. Also, it would save them from the emotional torture they would perhaps encounter in the future after realizing a kid they have been raising as their own in the biological connection is not their child (Holland 2011). The legislation on mandatory DNA tests at birth would also help save children who would possibly be victims of disconnection from the real biological ties, from the pains of realizing the father they know is not their biological father.

Additionally, mandatory paternity tests would help a child to grow with a strong sense of identity. Children would have a strong sense of identity emanating from real knowledge of their biological link. With a true understanding of character, the child would be able to know their health history and their hereditary factors that would influence their preventive health. Further, the children would be able to get financial support from their genuine biological father. Financial support from actual biological parents would help them because there would be no time when such support would be subject to a court process.

Further, the law should provide room for DNA tests in case the mother is in doubt of the paternity of their child at the time of birth (Draper 2007). A specific duration of time should be given so that the men suspected or those that are claiming to be the biological fathers of children take DNA tests at different times within the period to identify the real biological father. The mandatory paternity tests at birth would help clarify the doubt for all mothers who may be uncertain about the fathers of their children. Clarification of doubt regarding paternity would help protect the mothers from the guilt of thinking that they attributed the paternity of their children to wrong men. Moreover, the clarification of paternity doubt would save her from emotional torture of having to explain to her child anything. The torture of having to explain anything was pertaining erroneous attributed to the paternity status of a child at birth. Also, the mother would avoid legal consequences in the event they reside in a country where paternity fraud is criminalized.

There are several states that have established laws on their books on paternity fraud. One of the countries with laws against paternity fraud is Australia, where the Victorian county court in the year 2002 gave a restitution award to Mr. Magill. The restitution was of an amount of 70 million dollars for damages and economic loss as a result of DNA results which showed that among the three children for whom he was paying support, only one was his (Cannold 2008). The judgment in the year two thousand and two have helped suppress cases of mothers lying about the paternity of their children in the country.

Another state with current laws on paternity fraud includes Canada. Paternity fraud is included in the countries criminal code. A person is considered to have committed paternity fraud in the country in case they dishonestly deceit regarding a child's paternity identity. In case they make unfair nondisclosure regarding the paternity of a child or if they unfairly exploit or induces any person or the public to give any property or to suffer financial losses directly in link to fraudulent paternity lie. Everyone commits any of the paternity offenses listed in countries criminal code is liable for an imprisonment term or a fine.

South Korea is another country that has instituted laws against paternity fraud. In the country, a man was awarded forty-two thousand three hundred and eighty dollars for compensation for suffering and pain; he went raising a kid who was not biologically his. Mr. Doe was awarded the amount when a DNA test established that his ex-wife claiming their child paternity was wrong; it was misattributed.

States with laws against paternity frauds have made progress in the right direction towards the eradication of vices of paternity frauds in the society. Eradication of the negatives brought about by paternity fraud saves the many families and individuals from lifelong pains, which would be caused by malicious perpetrators of paternal frauds.

Lastly, the law can curb paternity fraud by providing for restitution for the victims of the crime. For the financial burden and emotional hurt men who may have suffered the vice of paternal fraud deserve to receive restitution upon the establishment of the fact that they were duped on the paternity of the child, they have been taking care of. The restitution for the men who may have fallen victims to paternity fraud would be in terms of reimbursement of the funds spent in child support. Since the calculation of the amounts spent in child support would be cumbersome and oftentimes inaccurate in actual figures, the victims are often times paid yearly averages.

In addition, the victims of paternity fraud can be restituted for the hard work involved in childbearing, and the breaking of the emotional attachment developed with the child over the years in fines charged by courts and passed on to the victim's men (Epsetin 2003). The emotional attachment fine is paid because of the emotional pain the duped men encounter after having lived in a lie for so long.

Together with the payment of fines to the paternally duped man and the reimbursement of funds, the man is reinstituted by the reversal of property. In the event the man had given out any property in support of the wrongly attributed child, they can have such a property given back to them, through a court process. The property may have been given out as an inheritance to the wrongly attributed child, and regardless the man has the right to get their property back.

In the restitution of the expenses, a man may have spent in the case of wrong and malicious paternity fraud. A court may order that the amount required to be paid to the victims be paid in piecemeal. This is especially so in the event a court finds out that genuinely the liable mother of the child is not able to pay for the expenses the man may have incurred in raising the child and for the emotional damages a man may have gone through in lump sum. In such a case, a court of law may order that the liable mother pays the whole amount in installments spread out for a number of years. Also, there would be no interest rate charged for the amount paid to the victims over the years.

Conclusion

All cases of paternal fraud should be criminalized so as to stop save the victims of the crime from the loss of resources; Men who fall victim to the crimes paternity fraud end wasting both their resources of time and material things. The resources they would otherwise spend on their real genuine children. In the end, such men end feeling that they wasted their live...