WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that a man's children who were conceived through artificial insemination after his death cannot get Social Security survivor benefits.
Justices unanimously ruled that twins born to Robert Capato's surviving wife Karen did not qualify for survivor benefits because of a requirement that the federal government use state inheritance laws.
The Capato twins, conceived using Robert Capato's frozen sperm, were born 18 months after their father died of esophageal cancer. Karen Capato's application for survivor benefits on behalf of the twins was rejected by the Social Security Administration, which said Robert Capato needed to be alive during the children's conception to qualify. A federal judge agreed, saying they had to qualify as Capato's children before his death or qualify under state inheritance law as children who could legally inherit.
Capato died a Florida resident, and Florida law expressly bars children conceived posthumously from inheritance, unless they are named in a will. The only beneficiaries named in Capato's will are his wife, their son and his two children from a previous marriage.
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