Bi understood how far-fetched her allegations sounded. “If it were not for all the hard evidence, it’s too shocking to believe [Rebecca Smith] did what she did to kill my son,” Bi wrote on Facebook, using Smith’s real name. Perhaps a kind friend could have suggested to Bi that there were other explanations. Instead, Bi had a set of legal adversaries and a supportive echo chamber. On Facebook, GCs and IPs alike expressed sympathy for Bi’s tragic posts: Everyone knew bad surrogates existed, and based on Bi’s claims, it sounded like Smith was one. Aimee Eyvazzadeh, a Bay Area fertility doctor and influencer, called Smith “a criminal” and “a psycho.” Bi’s $1,275-an-hour lawyer, Elizabeth Sperling, wondered whether digging through social media posts might show Smith engaging in “strenuous activity” that could explain the death.
Bi’s husband focused on stabilizing the family, a move he credits with saving their marriage. He blamed the hospital, not Smith, but told me that the litigation is “her grieving process.” He tried to stay out of the legal stuff so that Bi couldn’t blame him too.
Smith had planned to go back to work shortly after giving birth. Instead, she couldn’t stop bleeding. Even though SAI had determined she hadn’t breached the contract, the escrow stopped paying, leaving Smith reliant on disability benefits as she faced an increasing pile of terrifying bills.
When Smith was finally cleared to return to work, a month after Leon died, Bi emailed Smith’s HR department to ask about her health plan. Bi also reported Smith to a federal agency, claiming that Smith was committing fraud. The stress on Smith was already high: Her supervisor at work had found her crying on and off for a day.
Smith hadn’t heard from Bi since her terse reply to the condolence email. Then, Bi texted her a screenshot of a Facebook post about another GC who’d had an abruption at almost 32 weeks—but that GC had called 911 and the baby had lived.
Next, Bi iMessaged a photo of Leon’s corpse to Smith’s 7-year-old son’s iPad.
In the months after Leon died, Bi:
Called the FBI 12 times. Reported Smith, SAI, the hospital, and Clarity escrow to more than a dozen state and federal regulators and numerous professional organizations. Launched a new round of her $30 million venture fund, backed by Marc Andreessen and David Sacks, President Trump’s “AI and crypto czar,” on Leon’s due date. Posted Leon’s ChatGPT-written endorsement from heaven, offering his “eternal blessings” for her work. Created TikToks, Instagram Reels, Facebook posts, X threads, LinkedIn Updates, and a website for her advocacy. Posted links disclosing Smith’s full name, photo, address, employer, mortgage license number, and son’s first name to her website. Asked her husband, again and again, how it was possible that Smith had carried her son but felt “nothing” about his death.
Bi has abandonment issues that she traces back to her twenties, when her father divorced her mom for the mistress who’d conceived his long-awaited son. She got on lithium for her bipolar disorder in early 2021 and began looking for surrogates as soon as she stopped feeling “sedated.” I spoke to the therapist Bi hired to consult with her and Valdeiglesias. She told me that, of the 792 intended parents she has evaluated for surrogacy or gamete donation in the last decade, she has declined to recommend only about a dozen. “I’m not gatekeeping,” she said. When it comes to serious mental illness, she added, it’s up to them to disclose. One of Bi’s fertility doctors, meanwhile, told me it’s not his place to scrutinize intended parents. He defers to the recommendation of the psychological interviewer.
If an intended parent gets turned down, they can usually find another therapist, another clinic, another agency. But without anyone questioning her plans, Bi seemed betrayed by the challenges of third-party reproduction. “Surrogacy is supposed to be the safest route,” she wrote on Instagram. It wasn’t just Leon’s death that pushed Bi into her spiral of legal action and social media posts. It was the apparent lack of control of having her child inside another woman’s body—the most basic fact of surrogacy.