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Judge Grants Child Custody to Transsexual Man; Says He is Legally Male

By Mitch Stacy
Originally published in the Sun–Sentinel, February 21, 2003

CLEARWATER — A judge granted child custody Friday to a transsexual man engaged in a bitter divorce case and ruled he is legally a male under Florida law.

The transgender custody case is the first in Florida courts and possibly the first in the nation.

Circuit Judge Gerard O’Brien said Michael Kantaras, who was born female, can legally adopt his wife’s teenage son and be listed as the father of a child she conceived during their marriage with donated sperm.

Legal experts have said the ruling could provide a legal definition of gender in Florida, determine a transsexual person’s child custody rights and give non–biological parents and stepparents a legal foundation to seek visitation or custody.

Florida law bans same–sex marriages and bars homosexuals from adopting children.

In his conclusions, O’Brien wrote &wuot;the marriage law of Florida clearly provides that marriage shall take place between one man and one woman. It does not provide when such status of being a man or woman shall be determined.”

O’Brien also said that under Florida law, “there is no statutory requirement that the (marriage license) applicants shall prove their gender by producing a birth certificate.”

Michael Kantaras was born Margo Kantaras in 1959. He had a sex&ncash;change operation in Texas in 1986 and legally changed his name there.

His wife, Linda Kantaras, knew her husband had been a woman when they married in Florida in 1989. Michael later left his wife for another woman.

Linda Kantaras’ lawyers argued that she mistakenly thought her husband was legally a man when the two wed, when he adopted her child and when she bore a son two years later by artificial insemination.

Three expert witnesses testified that people like Michael Kantaras are defined as males in the medical community because they do not have female reproductive organs or female hormones.

The state approved a law prohibiting same–sex marriages after the Kantaras’ wedding. Michael Kantaras’ lawyer said that law and another banning homosexuals from adopting might be unconstitutional.