Netflix Faces Invasion of Privacy Suit for Outing Fertility Doctor’s Secret Children in ‘Our Father’ Documentary
variety.comGene Maddaus Senior Media Writer Netflix has reinvented television largely due to true crime. But the genre has also created a lot of work for the streamer’s legal team.
For every hit like “Baby Reindeer,” “Making a Murderer” or “Inventing Anna,” there are real people who feel wronged by their portrayal and sue for defamation.
The latest case offers an unusual twist. Three women are suing Netflix in federal court over “Our Father,” a 2022 documentary about Donald Cline, an Indiana fertility doctor who secretly fathered 94 children.
The women do not claim that Netflix got anything wrong. Instead, they are suing for “public disclosure of private facts,” arguing that the documentary outed them as Cline’s “secret children.” The First Amendment generally gives publishers wide latitude to say true things.
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