May 09, 2015
A paternity test for twin girls in New Jersey has determined that the children have two separate fathers, NorthJersey.com reports.
The case of the 2-year-old, non-identical twins being fathered by different men - or heteropaternal dizygotic twins - was discovered as a result of a legal dispute over child support payments in Passaic County.
State Superior Court Judge Sohail Mohammed ruled on Monday that a man, identified as A.S. in court papers, who was originally named as the father of both girls by the mother (identified as T.M.), would only have to pay child support for the one daughter as a result of the test.
The mother testified in the case that she had sexual intercourse with another man the same week she did with A.S., creating the necessary conditions for the uncommon yet not unprecedented birth. This rare phenomenon is simplified by The Daily Beast's Kent Sepkowitz:
One woman ovulated, had sex with Gentleman Caller 1, then ovulated a second time within a few days (a rare but not unheard of phenomenon) and had sex with Gentleman Caller 2. Each coital act yielded a zygote; each zygote matured into fetus-hood, then live birth, and now personhood.
