Where is Dr Donald Cline from Netflix’s Our Father now? In his 80s, he’s still alive and lives in Indiana where he inseminated female patients – but he still hasn’t confessed to a motive

May 17 , 2022

Netflix’s Our Father outlines the scandal of Dr Donald Cline. Photo: @BetterknowYou/Twitter

Joining Netflix’s roster of true crime documentaries, Our Father shares the shocking plot of a former doctor who inseminated female patients without permission

He has at least 90 biological children, as exposed by his daughter Jacoba Ballard and Fox59’s Angela Ganote, but he was only slapped with one year’s probation and a US$500 fine

Netflix’s latest release Our Father joins the streamer’s roster of chilling true crime documentaries. It tells the disturbing narrative of fertility doctor Donald Cline who used his own sperm to inseminate his female patients who came to him for artificial insemination. He has fathered over 90 (and counting) biological children across the States.

The documentary shows one of Cline’s daughters, Jacoba Ballard, who exposed the story in 2014 with the help of Fox59 reporter Angela Ganote. She then discovered her long list of step siblings through DNA testing sites, Ancestry.com and 23andMe, and reached out to them via Facebook.

Our Father is a documentary that tells the true story of Dr Donald Cline. Photo: @NetflixLife/Twitter

Despite the story catching nationwide – and now worldwide – attention, it’s still harrowing to learn that Cline got away with his sinister acts in the end.

According to the The Atlantic, Cline is still alive but keeps a low profile in his hometown of Indianapolis, Indiana. He also still has many supporters within the community today, despite his fathering almost 100 people without their mothers’ consent.

Here we take a look at Cline’s whereabouts, consequences and motives for his heinous acts.

The story of Donald Cline

In December 2017, Dr Donald Cline received a one-year suspended sentence for lying when he’d denied being a sperm donor to unwitting patients. Photo: AP

According to The Atlantic, Cline opened his clinic back in 1979 when infertility was a relatively new medical speciality. This gave him a certain advantage to build his reputation among the community and he quickly became the go-to fertility doctor for couples who couldn’t conceive children naturally.

As mentioned in the Netflix documentary, Cline is seen as a respected figure in his community. He is a brilliant doctor, an elder in his church and has always been perceived by his friends – and even by some of his patients – as “empathetic and full of compassion”, as quoted from The Atlantic.

Cline is still alive today, still living in his hometown in Indiana, and is believed to be in his 80s. However, the real punch to the gut is that – besides not feeling remorse for his actions – some of his children live only a few blocks away from him. One of his former patients, Liz White, told The Atlantic that “the former doctor lives down the street over there. I live down the street over there, and my mum lives in town here”.