'Medical rape': Prominent fertility doctor secretly impregnated patient with his own sperm, lawsuit states

A prominent fertility doctor is facing a federal lawsuit from a former patient who claims he secretly impregnated her with his own sperm during an artificial insemination procedure decades ago.

Dr. Merle Berger is one of the founders of Boston IVF Fertility Clinic and a former professor at Harvard Medical School. He is accused of impregnating a patient more than 40 years ago.

Sarah Depoian, a 73-year-old from Maine, first visited Berger in 1979 for fertility services because her husband could not impregnate her. Depoian decided to undergo intrauterine insemination, a procedure in which sperm is inserted directly into the uterus.

Depoian and her husband paid a "significant amount of money" for the fertility treatment, according to the lawsuit filed on Wednesday in Massachusetts District Court.

Berger allegedly told Depoian that he would insert "the sperm of a medical resident who had similar physical traits as my husband" and the donor would be unknown to the couple.

Depoian had a baby girl in 1981.

Late last year, Depoian's now-adult daughter purchased a home ancestry kit.

The lawsuit claimed that the daughter — 42-year-old Carolyn Bester — learned that she was related to Berger's granddaughter and his second cousin based on information from Ancestry.com and 23andMe DNA kits.

"I knew plenty of people who tried DNA tests, and I actually thought I was going to have a lot of fun doing the research," Bester told reporters on Wednesday.

She allegedly spoke to some of her new-found relatives and came to the conclusion that Berger is her biological father.

"Somebody who was related to him reached out to me and asked me how we were related, and I said, 'Interesting, I don't know,'" said Bester, a New Jersey-based lawyer.

"To say I was shocked when I figured this out would be an extreme understatement," Bester stated. "It feels like reality has shifted."

"It was really, really shocking and horrible to find that out, that that's your life's story and that's the story of how you were created is not great, to say the least," she said.

Depoian's attorney, Adam Wolf, told reporters, "Dr. Berger masturbated in his own medical office, walked over to his patient while he was carrying his own sperm, and then deliberately inserted that sperm into his patient's body, all the while knowing that she did not consent."

"Some people call this horrific act medical rape," Wolf said. "But regardless of what you call it, Dr. Berger's heinous and intentional misconduct is unethical, unacceptable, and unlawful."

Depoian said, "It's hard to imagine not trusting your own doctor. We never dreamt he would abuse his position of trust and perpetrate this extreme violation."

The lawsuit accuses Berger of committing fraudulent concealment, intentional misrepresentation, and violating Massachusetts' consumer protection law.

Depoian is seeking “damages in an amount sufficient to compensate her for her injuries.”

Berger has denied the accusations.

Berger’s lawyer, Ian Pinta, issued a statement on the doctor's behalf: “The allegations, which have changed repeatedly in the six months since the plaintiff’s attorney first contacted Dr. Berger, have no legal or factual merit, and will be disproven in court.”

Boston IVF said in a statement:

We recently learned that Dr. Merle Berger was named in a lawsuit. This matter occurred more than 40 years ago which was prior to Dr. Berger’s employment at Boston IVF and, in fact, before our company existed. We wish to highlight that the field of reproductive endocrinology and infertility is much different than it was decades ago, and the safety measures and safeguards currently in place would make such allegations virtually impossible nowadays. Patients should be assured that our field continues to uphold the most rigorous ethical and medical standards.

Boston IVF was founded in 1986, and Berger retired in 2020, according to the fertility clinic's website.

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