Nice work if you can get it!

A court judge in Stuttgart Germany has been asked to decide on a case of "honourable intention" in a situation where a man was hired by his neighbour to get his wife pregnant. Demetrius Soupolos and his former beauty queen wife Traute wanted a family. Demetrious however discovered that he was unable to father a child when the fertility hospital reported to him that he was unfortunately sterile. 

Beauty Queen Traute

Both Demetrius and Traute were disappointed at the news. Calming his wife, Demetrius came up with a cunning plan. Their neighbour Frank Maus was married and had two healthy good looking children. Demetrius asked Frank if he could help to get his wife pregnant and Frank agreed. Franks wife naturally had some serious misgivings about the whole venture and did not want Frank to take part.

Frank looked very much like Demetrius and so the pair decided to go ahead with the plan.  Frank was also paid around £2000 by way of encouragement. For the next six months, Frank would spend up to three nights a week trying to impregnate Traute. 

Frank tried desperately on at least 72 occasions to get Traute pregnant. Franks wife said that she was getting increasingly dubious about what was transpiring. Frank told her he was also getting to be quite desperate and he was only doing it for the money. He thought that his wife's concerns might be causing him stress which would interfere with his abilities. 

After six months, Demetrius was also somewhat disappointed and arranged for Frank to have a hospital check up which he duly did. The doctors announcement that Frank was also sterile which came as a shock to everyone, with the exception of Franks wife. Who then confessed that Frank was not the father of their two children. Believing herself that her husband Frank to be sterile. Franks wife had sought her own remedy to their situation.

So now Demetrious is sueing Frank for breach of contract in an effort to get his money back. But Frank is refusing to return the money because he did not guarantee conception would take place, only that he would give it a honest effort!

Well this urban legend has been doing the rounds since 2009. It's rather interesting to see how the story has been repeated and embroidered further. The latest version now adds:

Traute and Franks wife Ute eventually became close friends as each of them had a common bond that comes with the difficulties of trying to build a family with a husband who is sterile. Their friendship grew as their husbands one time friendship drifted further and further apart. In an effort to build bridges, Franks wife Ute decided to introduce her new found friend Traute (the once upon a time wife of Demetrius Soupolos) to the mystery person who had impregnated her. There was a relationship sparked between the pair and the outcome is that Traute and her new husband Wolf have started a family of their own. Traute, Wolf and Ute's children are now happy healthy siblings. 

As for the court case, that still remains to be settled.