Emotional End : Joy and Grief Mix as Judge Hands Down Ruling in Historic Custody Case

SANTA ANA —  As Judge Richard N. Parslow Jr. handed the genetic parents of a baby boy a ringing victory Monday, Crispina and Mark Calvert bowed their heads in gratitude, she quietly crying, he gathering her in the crook of his arm.

“Thank God,” a visibly shaken Crispina Calvert, the baby’s genetic mother, said after the ruling in Orange County Superior Court. “Justice has prevailed.”

But the Calverts’ joy was matched by surrogate mother Anna L. Johnson’s grief. Johnson, who lost the chance to visit the child she carried for nine months, could not bear to attend the session, which she had earlier compared to an “execution.” Johnson instead spent the morning in church with her lawyer.

The day’s hearing took place in front of a packed courtroom while dozens of reporters and cameramen jostled in the hall for a chance to question the participants in the custody battle. And though the judge’s ruling centered on the legal issues raised by the surrogation arrangement, there was no defusing the emotions that the nationally known case has dragged to the surface.

Crispina Calvert dabbed her eyes with tissue throughout the hearing, and Mark Calvert put one arm around her and kissed her gently as the judge announced his ruling. They broke their embrace briefly when a lawyer representing Johnson asked the judge to grant her visitation rights while the case is appealed.

Both of the Calverts quickly raised their heads and fixed their gaze on Parslow as he pondered the idea. But he denied that request, making the Calverts’ victory complete.

William G. Steiner, the court-appointed guardian for the baby, emerged from the session grinning broadly and proclaiming that the infant was “the real winner in all this.”

For the past five weeks, the baby’s name as well as his custody has been in dispute, but that too ended. “The first thing I’m going to do now is put this baby’s name on a birth certificate,” Steiner said.

By day’s end, the infant officially became Christopher Michael Calvert. Johnson continues to call him Matthew and has vowed to fight the ruling all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Harold LaFlamme, the baby’s attorney, was jubilant. “You either have two parents or three parents in this situation,” he said. “In (the judge’s) view, two parents is better.”

With weeks of legal wrangling behind them and long months of appeals ahead, there was little forgiveness in the air. While the judge called Crispina Calvert “the type of person who does have a heart” and who might keep Johnson apprised about the baby, Crispina Calvert was less sure.

“I still have to think about that,” she said at the conclusion of the hearing. “It’s too emotional right now.”

Mark Calvert was tougher. Though he said he does not want to be bitter toward Johnson, Calvert conceded that he could barely conceal his disdain for her.

“The only bonding Anna Johnson has is with your television cameras,” he said to the field of microphones in front of him.

Johnson was conspicuously absent from the court session that decided the fate of the baby she carried under contract for the Calverts.

She emerged at noon, however, for a press conference with her lawyers in Orange. That session also was awash in emotion as Johnson sat before more than a dozen television cameras and scores of reporters with tears running down her face.

“I can sit here, and I can answer all your questions, but as far as understanding exactly how I feel,” Johnson said, her voice cracking, “the best way I think I can describe it is that I’m in a deep state of mourning for my son.”

Johnson’s lawyer, Richard C. Gilbert, blasted the judge’s ruling. He said it was influenced by the emotion surrounding the case and warned that if it were upheld it would result in women “being put back 1,000 years and turned into cows.”

Monday’s news conferences capped a trial that has been actively fought in the press as well as the courtroom, and the day’s events illustrated the uneasy relationship that has developed between the parties and the reporters covering them.

At Johnson’s news conference, Gilbert spent several minutes warning reporters that any “entertainment” media present would have to leave or face the possibility of legal action. He singled out the television program “Inside Edition,” as well as the tabloids National Enquirer and Star.

That threat came despite months of courting the media, including an appearance on the Donahue show.

The scene outside the courtroom was less tense, though no less hectic. The Calverts, looking dazed amid the crush of reporters, said they looked forward to the day when they could put their national exposure behind them and get on with the business of raising their child.

“We never intended on making history or setting precedent,” Mark Calvert said. “Christopher Michael is worth everything. . . . He’s been worth everything we went through.”