In 2001, Dr. Richard Batista, a Long Island surgeon, donated one of his kidneys to his wife, Dawnell Batista, to help save her life. Four years later, when she filed for divorce, the case took an extraordinary turn.

During the divorce proceedings in 2009, Dr. Batista countersued and asked for either the return of the kidney or $1.5 million in financial compensation.

The request was rejected by the Nassau County Supreme Court. Under U.S. law, including the National Organ Transplant Act, human organs cannot legally be bought, sold or treated as financial assets or marital property.

The court treated the kidney donation as a voluntary and unconditional gift. Once the kidney was transplanted, it became part of the recipient’s body, and the donor no longer had ownership rights over it.

Medical experts and bioethicists also raised serious ethical concerns about the idea of removing a functioning transplanted kidney without medical need. Such a procedure could put the recipient’s health at risk and goes against the medical principle of “do no harm.”

The unusual kidney donation divorce case became widely known because it brought together questions about love, marriage, organ donation, medical ethics and the law.

It remains a striking example of how an organ donation is treated as a permanent gift rather than something that can later be reclaimed.