A mother who persuaded her adopted teenage daughter to become pregnant by artificial insemination because she wanted a baby for herself has been jailed for five years in Britain, in a case that raises concern over how easily donor sperm can be obtained.
Previously secret court documents showed that the daughter, a virgin, was made to inseminate herself alone in her bedroom seven times over a two-year period, starting in 2008 when she was 14, using syringes of semen bought online by the mother from sperm bank Cryos in Denmark.
She eventually became pregnant at 16 and gave birth at 17.
The extraordinary circumstances of her pregnancy came to light after midwives became suspicious of the mother, because she was trying to prevent her daughter from bonding with the new baby.
In a ruling made in March last year, but only published now after the conclusion of the mother's criminal trial, Judge Peter Jackson described "an abiding sense of disbelief that a parent could behave in such a wicked and selfish way towards a vulnerable child".
The mother, who was imprisoned for child cruelty, had three adopted daughters.
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