On December 11, 2025, after suffering a miscarriage, Tiffany Score and Steven Mills welcomed a healthy daughter named Shea.
The Florida couple had entrusted the Fertility Center of Orlando, an IVF (in vitro fertilization) clinic, with helping them expand their family.
But when Shea was born, they realized there had been a mix-up. Despite both parents and their families being caucasian, the baby girl “displayed the physical appearance of a racially non-caucasian child,” the couple’s lawsuit states.
The couple who gave birth to another family’s baby after an IVF mix-up has reached a custody agreement with the biological parents
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DNA testing confirmed that Shea was not genetically related to them and that she was of South Asian descent, meaning that the clinic had implanted the wrong embryo.
This resulted not only in legal action against the fertility clinic but also in what Tiffany and Steven described as the “moral obligation” to find the baby’s biological parents.
The case gained even more attention when the clinic responsible for the error announced it would be shutting down amid the legal battle.
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Without revealing the couple’s identity, Tiffany and Steven announced in April that they had finally identified Shea’s biological parents.
“This ends one chapter in our heartbreaking journey, but it raises new issues that will have to be resolved,” Tiffany and Steven stated at the time.
Tiffany Score and Steven Mills feared they could lose custody of Shea to her biological parents after raising the baby since birth
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The couple feared that Shea’s genetic parents would seek full custody of the baby they had been raising for four months and had come to see as their own daughter.
Tiffany and Steven’s attorney, Jack Scarola, said they were relieved to learn that the baby’s biological parents had not made such a demand.
Now that Shea is six months old, the two couples have finally reached an agreement.
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Court papers filed on Friday (June 12) reveal that Tiffany and Steven have “come to a mutually devised custody agreement” with the baby’s biological parents.
Under the agreement, Tiffany and Steven will “continue as the permanent custodial parents of their daughter,” the court documents state, per the Orlando Sentinel.
Scarola said the two couples “have begun and intend to continue to foster a relationship of friendship and trust.”
Tiffany and Steven have sued the Fertility Center of Orlando and its lead reproductive endocrinologist over the error
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“I’m glad the parties have reached an agreement while this child is relatively young,” Judge Margaret Schreiber said during a court hearing.
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In January, Tiffany and Steven sued the Fertility Center of Orlando and its head reproductive endocrinologist, Dr. Milton McNichol, accusing them of implanting the wrong embryo in April 2025.
The couple said information they had obtained revealed “laboratory-clinic errors,” which they hope will help speed up the case.
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Amid the scandal, the Longwood-based clinic released a statement announcing that, after “thoughtful consideration,” it would close by May 20.
It further said it was “actively cooperating with an investigation to support one of our patients in determining the source of an error that resulted in the birth of a child who is not genetically related to them.”
The IVF clinic reportedly filed for bankruptcy in late 2024 and was cited by the Florida Department of Health the following year for violations.
Tiffany and Steven’s remaining frozen embryo will be genetically tested to confirm whether it is truly theirs
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As a result of a lawsuit filed by Tiffany and Steven, the clinic conducted extensive DNA testing of other embryos created and stored at the same time as theirs.
This led doctors to identify Patient 004, Shea’s biological mother, who was the clinic’s only other patient in March 2020.
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
Tiffany and Steven also announced that they had moved what they believe is their remaining frozen embryo, which had been stored at the Fertility Center of Orlando, to another medical center.
Image credits: Facebook/Tiff Score
“That embryo will be tested for parentage and then the Plaintiffs will determine next steps,” attorney Mara Hatfield, who represents the couple, said in court.
The couple wants the case to provide answers and compensation for “the expenses they have incurred and the severe emotional trauma that they endured and will continue to experience.”
“We will love and be this child’s parents forever,” the couple said
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Through their lawsuit, Tiffany and Steven hope to start a new chapter in their lives in which they can “begin living more freely and to finally celebrate the one beautiful thing that has come from all of this: our daughter.”
The proud parents said Shea “is completely innocent and so undeserving” of the lifelong consequences of the medical error.
“Only one thing is as absolutely certain today as it was on the day our daughter was born —we will love and will be this child’s parents forever.”
“Makes you wonder how many times this has happened,” a reader wrote
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