The Case of the Serial Sperm Donor

In 2015, Vanessa van Ewijk, a carpenter in the Netherlands, decided that she wanted to have a child. She was 34 and single, and so, like many women, she sought out a sperm donor.

She considered conceiving through a fertility clinic, but the cost was prohibitive for her. Instead, she found an ideal candidate through a website called Desire for a Child, one of a growing number of online sperm markets that match candidate donors directly with potential recipients. Ms. van Ewijk was drawn to one profile in particular, that of Jonathan Jacob Meijer, a Dutch musician in his 30s.

Mr. Meijer was handsome, with blue eyes and a mane of curly blond hair. Ms. van Ewijk liked how genuine he appeared. “I spoke to him on the phone and he seemed gentle and kind and well-behaved,” she said. “He liked music, and he talked about his thoughts on life. He didn’t come on strong in any sense. He seemed like the boy next door.”

About a month later, after some back-and-forth, she and Mr. Meijer arranged to meet at Central Station, a busy railway hub in The Hague. He provided her with his sperm, and in return she paid him 165 euros, about $200, and covered his travel costs. Months later she gave birth to a daughter — her first child and, Mr. Meijer told her, his eighth. (Mr. Meijer declined to be interviewed for this article but did answer some questions by email, and stated that he did not grant permission for his name to be published.)

In 2017, when she decided to conceive again, she reached out once more to Mr. Meijer. Once again he met with her and, for a similarly modest fee, provided a container of his semen; once again she became pregnant, and gave birth to a boy.

Even before then, however, Ms. van Ewijk had learned some unsettling news. She had connected on Facebook with another single mother who also had used Mr. Meijer as a donor, and who told her that, according to an investigation in 2017 by the Dutch Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport, he had fathered at least 102 children in the Netherlands through numerous fertility clinics, a tally that did not include his private donations through websites.