Grandmother-To-Be After Her Son's Death

11.03.2011

BEDFORD, Texas (KXAN) - Her story caught national attention three years ago, and now a North Texas mother is getting ready to unfreeze her dead son's sperm to try to keep his legacy alive.

Eric Skeeter punched Nikolas Evans, 21, during a fight outside a downtown Austin nightclub in March of 2009. Nikolas fell to the ground and hit his head and died ten days later. His mother, Marissa Evans, got her wish after a judge allowed an Austin doctor to collect his sperm.

Now, Marissa is closer than ever to getting her first grandchild -- she's found a surrogate mother and egg donor.

"We're hoping that by the end of April our surrogate is pregnant," said Marissa. "And I just know it's going to work."

The egg donor and woman who might carry the child are two different people in two different countries. Marissa made a deal with a surrogacy clinic in another country not to ever reveal where they are located. After seven months of searching, she found the perfect egg donor in Russia.

"She really resembled him in facial features and education and interest and body type," said Marissa. "It was really kind of uncanny and I just knew that she was going to be the one."

Marissa said she checked into surrogacy clinics in the U.S. but they were all too expensive. Going out of the country for the procedures and shipping samples cross-country will cost around to $70,000. A friend has agreed to pay for three-quarters of the cost. For the rest, Marissa just launched a fundraiser online .

In the first 24 hours, nearly $1,000 had already been donated to help cover the surrogate mother's doctor bills and the trip to pick up the baby if all goes as planned.

There is always a chance it won't. If that happens Marissa said she will keep trying.

"I know there's going to be haters out there who don't believe in what I'm doing, but they also probably have never been in my shoes," said Marissa.

She admits her reasons for going through with the controversial process have changed. Right after Nikolas died, she wanted to replace her son to feel better, but now she believes she is doing it for him.

"He wanted kids" said Marissa. "He talked about kids for several years and so I just decided when I became stronger emotionally from the loss that I suffered that I would definitely make that happen for him because I'm still his mom."

There are also new developments in the criminal case involving the man who killed her son, Eric Skeeter. He was given ten years probation for the punch and run, but was recently booked into the Travis County Jail again.

Last month, Austin police said Skeeter, 30, ran from them after getting in a fight with his girlfriend. During a hearing March 16, a judge will decide whether or not he will have to serve out his 10 years of probation in prison.

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