UPDATE: With the passage of the Massachusetts Parentage Act, the definitions of legal parentage have been updated by the legislature.  Read this article to learn more: The Massachusetts Parentage Act by Polly Crozier, Director of Family Advocacy, GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders Original Post: About a year ago we posted a series entitled Who is a Legal Parent? and addressed the many ways in which a parent (someone who takes care of a child) can also be considered a legal parent (someone who the court recognizes has rights and obligations relating to the care of a child).   In the Venn Diagram to the left you can see that these two categories overlap but not everyone who is a legal parent acts like a parent, and not everyone who acts like a parent is recognized as a legal parent. Today, the Massachusetts SJC expanded the purple section of this diagram, recognizing that a non-biological parent who "jointly with the mother, received the child into their home and openly ...

Casino Billionaire to pay $100,000 per Month in Child Support for Non-Biological Child : As reported in a recent Boston.com Article , Billionaire Kirk Kerkorian, the major shareholder of MGM Resorts International, has settled with Lisa Bonder Kerkorian, to whom he was married for only 28 days, to pay over $10 million in child support arrears as well as $100,000 in child support per month. Even more shocking than the figures and the short term of the marriage is the fact that Mr. Kerkorian is not the biological father of the child and was purposefully defrauded by the mother who faked a DNA test. In Massachusetts, a person who is married within 300 days of the birth of the child to the mother is the legal parent of the child even if they are not the biological parent. This is a presumption that can be overcome with a paternity test. However, even if the paternity test proves that the husband is not the biological father, this does not necessarily mean he is not the legal father. S...