Surrogate Refused A $10,000 Offer To Abort The Baby She Was Carrying

CNNMost surrogacy stories end happily, but CNN is reporting on one that ended with lawyers and a baby that probably won't live a normal life.

Crystal Kelley, a 29-year-old single mom in Connecticut, agreed to carry a couple's child in exchange for a $22,000 fee, according to CNN.

She had a pleasant relationship with the unnamed couple until tests showed the five-month-old fetus she was carrying had serious abnormalities — including a cleft palate and and major heart defects.

Then the couple offered a deal that was unthinkable to Kelley: They'd give her $10,000 if she would abort the fetus. Kelley was anti-abortion and refused.

Then she got a letter from a lawyer, CNN reports.

"You are obligated to terminate this pregnancy immediately," wrote Douglas Fishman, an attorney in West Hartford, Connecticut. "You have squandered precious time."

Then Fishman, who was representing the couple, told Kelley's own lawyer that they planned to take the baby after it was born and immediately surrender it to the state. They could legally do that in Connecticut since the state considered them the baby's legal parents.

Taking advantage of a quirk of the law, Kelley decamped to a state where she would be considered the parent: Michigan.

She then gave the baby girl up to parents who were willing to raise her, according to CNN. Kelley told CNN she has gotten negative comments on her blog about her choice.

"I can't tell you how many people told me that I was bad, that I was wrong, that I should go have an abortion, that I would be damned to hell," she told CNN.