A father duped into thinking his child had been aborted told a jury he had “mourned” and had been deprived of the first three years of her life.
He said he had been excited when he discovered his partner was pregnant and was bereft when she claimed she had terminated the pregnancy.
He told a jury it was not until a long time after the birth he realised his daughter had in fact been born and taken by another man.
Perth Sheriff Court was told the child’s mother and her homosexual friend had signed the birth certificate and claimed to be the child’s natural parents.
The court was told DNA tests proved the witness was the child’s real father.
He told the trial he had been “over the moon” when he discovered the woman had fallen pregnant with his child.
“She got more and more reluctant about having the child near the end of our relationship,” he said.
“She split up with me and told me she was going to have an abortion.”
The child’s mother and her homosexual male friend are on trial for fraud, accused of duping the biological father into thinking the child had been aborted.
They have accepted that they put their own names on the birth certificate and that the biological father was not aware she had been born.
The court was told that the gay man claimed the baby girl had been given to him by a lesbian lawyer called Clare Green, acting as a surrogate.
The biological father said he was suspicious about the gay man’s story of how he had come to have a child and eventually began a civil court case, which led to the child being DNA tested and proven to be his.
He told the jury that he had married since the birth and had also formally obtained custody of the child at the centre of the case.
The 29-year-old woman, from Perth, and her friend are alleged to have made up a series of claims starting before the baby was born in February 2011 to dupe the father into thinking the child had never been born.
It is alleged that between 1 June 2010 and 18 April 2013 they carried out the fraud at Perth High Street, Perth Royal Infirmary, Perth police office and Perth Registry Office.
They are alleged to have set up a Facebook profile for a fictional woman, who claimed she was acting as a surrogate mother for the male accused.
The fake Facebook persona then pretended she had handed the female child to the man and he had full custody of the child.
He is alleged to have pretended to Perth Registrar Alison Breingan that he was the girl’s father.
The mother is alleged to have pretended to the true father and another man that she had not given birth.
The couple deny the charges and the trial, before Sheriff William Wood, continues.