Charlotte Danciu: 'A Beacon of Hope' in the World of Adoption and Reproductive Law.
By FSU LAW - Alumni Focus
Spring 2005

Source: FSU LAW - Spring 2005 Edition

Charlotte Danciu:
'A Beacon of Hope' in the World of Adoption and Reproductive Law

Charlotte Danciu is one of those fortunate people for whom her work not only is a passion, but a labor of love. She has practiced family law in South Florida for more than 22 years in the areas of private adoption, gestational and traditional surrogacy, paternity, egg and sperm donation contracts, and all aspects of reproductive law. She has attended more than 50 births and handled more than 2,000 adoptions.

The 1980 College of Law graduate has been called a "beacon of hope" to people who dream of having a baby, but for whatever reason, can't, as well as for women caught in "crisis pregnancies."

Danciu is recognized as an information source and an expert in her field, and has been on the cover of The New York Times featured in People and maire claire magazines, among other publications. She has appeared on the "Today Show with Katie Couric," "The Phil Donohue Show," "NewsNight with Aaron Braun," "The John Walsh Show," and on all the major television networks and cable stations as a result of court appearances dealing with issues related to her specialized practice.

She has represented hundreds of clients in the United States and abroad, and has successfully influenced Florida's legislation resulting in some of the most progressive adoption and surrogacy laws in the world.

Two famous adoption cases in the Florida Supreme Court and the Fourth District Court of Appeals earned her worldwide recognition and sealed her reputation as an aggressive advocate for women and children's rights.

The first, in 1995, was the "Baby Emily" case, in which Danciu represented a birth mother who wanted to let a family adopt her daughter. The adoption was blocked by the birth father, a convicted rapist, who sought custody of the child. The three-year battle reached the Florida Supreme Court, which established that birth fathers have no rights in cases of "pre-natal abandonment."

In the second case, she fought for the repeal of the "Scarlet Ltter Law," an experience she refers to as "the battle of my life." The state Legislature in October 2001 passed a law making it mandatory for birth mothers wishing to give a child up for adoption to place ads in local newspapers giving their sexual histories and names of possible fathers. Representing six women, Danciu challenged the law, saying it was a violation of their constitutional right to privacy. The Fourth District Court of Appeal agreed and a month later, the Florida Legislature and Gov. Jeb Bush repealed the law, instead establishing a paternity registry where men who think they have fathered a child can enroll to be contracted if the child is offered for adoption.

Handling Adoptions a 'Natural'

Danciu earned a bachelor's degree in exceptional child education childhood at Florida Atlantic University. While interning in elementary schools, she became frustrated with the system, and decided she could better advocate for children as a lawyer than as a teacher.

While waiting to begin law school, she trained as an Emergency Medical Technician. For leisure, she says, she reads William's Obstetrics and any assisted reproduction article she can get her hands on. They have helped her gain a better understanding of pregnancy and reproduction.

Danciu arrived at the College of Law in 1977 and calls her time at the law school the "some of the best years of my life." As a first-year, she was the class representative to the Student Bar Association, and in her second and third years, served as vice president and president of the organization.

In 1982, she succesfully handled one of the first battered women syndrome cases in Palm beach County and a number of DUIs before taking on her first adoptions. "Handling adoptions was a natural for me because I was a support to women in crisis, and I was helping people who wanted children," said Danciu, who, as a single woman adoption a special needs child in 1984.

She estimates that in the early 1980s and 1990s, she handled 75 percent of the adoptions in Florida. In the 1990s, she began focusing on other legal options to traditional adoption: surrogacy, gestational surrogacy, egg/sperm donation and embryo adoption. "Reproductive law is cutting-edge, and there are new technologies available that allow people to have their own biological child," she said. "Being infertile is a terrible thing and it's heart breaking for couples and individuals. But traditional and gestational surrogacy offer additional options to those who have been trying unsuccessfully to have a child. Surrogacy is a wonderful thing--if you have the right contract."

About 75 percent of her practice now involves reproductive law, and she devotes much of her time keeping up with medical technology and creating increasingly better contracts for an increasingly complex issue. "My contracts are evolving every year because there is little precedent and new issue skeep coming up. We need to address those issues by putting into writing the intentions of the parties and what the law provides as their legal rights. This is so important and hopefully avoids problems in the future."

In addition to the numerous surrogacies and egg and sperm donation contracts Danciu is writing, she is also handling the "adoptions" of embryos that would have otherwise been stored indefinetly or destroyed. She says that the embryos that are "adopted" as "extras", remaining after fortunate couples have completed their families through in vitro or either assisted reproduction methods.

"Everyone should be able to have a family of their of their own, if possible. Our goalis for our clients to have the biological or adopted child they've so desired. I'm here to insure that they achieve their dream smoothly through a competent medical and proper legal process."