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President of the Fathers’ Association of Trinidad and Tobago Rhondall Feeles has revealed that one in three men who had paternity testing done at a judiciary certified lab over a five year period, were not the biological fathers of children. He is calling for paternity tests to be made mandatory, to allow for there to be proof, before a child maintenance order is issued by the court. Feeles was speaking at a news conference in Couva on Monday on the topic of legislating paternity fraud and addressing its mental health impact on men and children. He presented test data from between 2020 to September 2025 which his Association received from a DNA lab certified by the judiciary. “Out of those 440 tests we see paternity not being confirmed for as many as 143 men. Giving you a percentage of approximately 33 percent which is in other words saying that, out of those tested, one in every three men were not the biological parents of their children,” Feeles said. He stated that the situation is in need of being critically addressed. Going deeper into the statistics, Feeles outlined two categories of men who did the test. One group were those who did it for peace of mind, and the legal group, were men who were before the court. They showed respective results of 33 and 29 percent not being the biological fathers. Speaking about those who were before the court, Feeles said that had the tests not been done, and these fathers were issued maintenance orders but were laid off from their jobs and no longer able to make the payments, they would have been sent to jail for a child that was never theirs. Feeles said that his Association reached out the Attorney General over this paternity fraud. “He is appalled by the statistics and most definitely he will like to have a sit down with us pertaining to crafting or laws, particularly where it comes to paternity fraud because it’s bigger than just having laws that prevent a man from paying maintenance for a child that is not his ... there must be legislation there that a man must have paternity proven before he is made to pay maintenance or given a maintenance order.” In the interim the Association is requesting from the Chief Justice that a practice order be put in circulation, at the earliest convenience, where paternity testing is made mandatory before the issuance of a maintenance order. He said that former chief justice Ivor Archie, seemed to be concerned and seemed to want to treat with the issue expeditiously before his resignation. They are now requesting that the newly installed Chief Justice Ronnie Boodoosingh take up the mantle. Feeles said that intervention is needed legislatively and also when it comes to the mental health impact on men and the impact on the child.
