A Los Angeles IVF clinic famously used by the likes Kim Kardashian, Chrissy Teigen and Paris Hilton is being sued for allegedly tossing a couple’s embryos on purpose.
Marissa Calhoun and Stephen Castaneda claim that Reproductive Partners Medical Group “intentionally” destroyed all of their embryos last October, during what the clinic later begrudgingly admitted was a disastrous clerical error, according to documents obtained by TMZ.
The heartbreaking mishap allegedly occurred just days after celeb-favorite physician Dr. Andy Huang — who worked with both Kim Kardashian and sister Khloe, and appeared on “Keeping Up With the Kardashians” — advised the couple to fertilize Calhoun’s stored embryos with her partner’s sperm.
Huang allegedly confirmed that Calhoun and Castaneda’s eggs were successfully fertilized last October and would be kept in an incubator, only to let them know days later that the clinic had thrown out the viable embryos-to-be, per TMZ.
Calhoun and Castaneda are slamming not just the clinic’s policies but its procedures and training for employees after they allege RPMG was initially tight-lipped about the oversight.
RPMG eventually confessed to its distraught patients that an employee failed to label their embryos and, seeing them in the incubator, “intentionally threw them away.”
“What makes this case so outrageous is that RPMG not only failed to label Marissa and Stephen’s embryos, but then threw away those unlabeled embryos without any thought or concern,” Adam Wolf, partner at law firm Peiffer Wolf, told TMZ.
Though the clinic did disclose records with the couple to further shed light on the situation — which Wolf notes is “required” — they allegedly “provided incomplete records on three separate occasions.”
“RPMG gaslighted Marissa and Stephen,” Wolf said. “This is no way to treat any patient, let alone people who trusted you to start their family.”
RPMG, which operates from multiple Southern California locations as well as a clinic in Beijing, describes itself as “national leaders in the treatment of infertility.”
