A widely circulated video showcasing a gay couple’s “surrogacy journey” has revealed that a baby boy is currently in the custody of a registered child sex offender. The couple, Logan Riley and Brandon Mitchell, gained viral attention after posting a video introducing their newborn son. It has since emerged that Mitchell is a convicted pedophile.
The video, which was initially shared by the couple on their own social media platforms, was meant to offer a heartwarming glimpse into the first year of their newborn’s life. However, it quickly drew scrutiny after being reposted on July 27 by Irish right-wing activist and political figure Derek Blighe on X (formerly Twitter).
“Unless a miracle happens, this child has almost no chance at a normal life,” Blighe wrote in the caption, a post that has since garnered over one million views. At the time, the couple’s identities were not publicly known, and Blighe’s post drew criticism and ridicule, particularly from advocates of same-sex adoption, who dismissed his concerns as homophobic.
Unless a miracle happens, this child has almost no chance at a normal life. pic.twitter.com/dwwXaH4Nbi
— Derek Blighe (@BligheDerek) July 27, 2025
“That is homophobic. If the child has two loving male parents, there is no evidence whatsoever that he or she will not prosper,” replied Bev Jackson of Alliance LGB.
Another response to Blighe’s comment from user @LouiseScot51918 racked up over 200,000 ‘likes,’ and read: “Makes me happy. That baby is going to be raised not to hate people and will be loved.”
Makes me happy. That baby is going to be raised not to hate people and will be loved. https://t.co/XIxMw2Caxt
— Lou to my friends.🏴🐶🐴 (@LouiseScot51918) July 27, 2025
But just 24 hours after the video went viral on social media, it has been confirmed that one of the men in the video is a registered child sex offender.
Brandon Keith Mitchell is a Tier 1 sex offender in the state of Pennsylvania, and was arrested in 2016 after attempting to solicit a 16-year-old boy for sexual abuse. The victim in the case was a student at Downingtown West High School, where Mitchell had worked as a chemistry teacher. He was 30 years old at the time.
According to records released by the Chester County District Attorney’s Office and the Downingtown Police Department, Mitchell solicited the boy to send him nude photographs. He also told the victim he wanted to watch him masturbate and sent the victim approximate 20 nude photographs of himself.
Police executed a search warrant of the teacher’s electronic devices and phone records, which revealed that he exchanged over 12,000 text messages with the victim. These conversations lasted from May 2013 until December 2014. Mitchell had instructed the victim to delete their conversations.
Police also recovered hundreds of other sexually explicit videos of the child on Mitchell’s laptop computer.
Mitchell pleaded guilty to felony child pornography possession and one court of Corruption of Minors, and was sentenced to up to 23 months of incarceration. But court records show that he was granted parole just two months following his conviction.
Part of his conditions included that he have no unsupervised contact with minors and that he surrender his teaching license. He quickly moved on to obtain a job as a chemist at Eurofins BioPharma Product Testing in Lancaster, where he has worked for the past 9 years.
In 2021, Mitchell married Logan Riley, a second-grade teacher from Maryland, and moved to Seven Valleys, Pennsylvania. In 2023, the two launched a GoFundMe to raise money for a surrogate, which Mitchell advertised on his LinkedIn.
“My name is Logan and I am a 2nd grade teacher. I am from Annapolis, MD and teach outside of Baltimore City. I enjoy the beach, swimming, and anything that involves water. I swam in both high school and college and lifeguarded during the summers. I enjoy being around friends and family and love teaching,” the GoFundMe reads. “My fiancé’s name is Brandon and he works in a pharmaceutical laboratory. He is from Lancaster, PA and works outside of the city. He enjoys traveling as he used to live in England and South Africa. He also enjoys politics, history, and experiencing other cultures. He values family and friends and he is excited to start our new family.”
No where in the GoFundMe’s description does Riley mention that his husband is a convicted sex offender.
In November of 2023, Riley updated the GoFundMe with the news that they had successfully found a surrogate.
“Our surrogate went through extensive medical and social worker evaluations in order to be approved for surrogacy. Once approved, the lengthy legal and financial process began. We are so excited that our amazing surrogate will carry one of our embryos for us, helping to expand our family,” Riley wrote in the update, signing it “Future Fathers, Logan and Brandon.”
The couple raised just over $2,000 from friends and family, though had a goal of $50,000.
Reduxx reached out to the division Pennsylvania State Police responsible for maintaining Mitchell’s registration, and was informed that the state does not automatically forbid individuals convicted of sex crimes from having children, gaining custody, or exercising parental rights.
While Pennsylvania’s adoption law does prohibits sex offenders from adopting or fostering children, gestational surrogacy circumvents any such laws through pre-birth parentage orders.
Pennsylvania is considered a “surrogate-friendly” state, and intended parents can obtain a pre-birth order, typically after the surrogate has entered her second trimester, which declares the intended parents as the legal parents and places their name on the child’s birth certifiate.
It is unclear if the surrogate was made aware that Mitchell was a convicted sex offender prior to agreeing to the arrangement.
Speaking to Reduxx, Helen Gibson of Surrogacy Concern expressed outrage at the news and called for an immediate investigation by local authorities.
“If it is correct that one of these men is a convicted sex offender then this is deeply concerning. Local authorities must investigate immediately, including exploring removal of the child as an urgent consideration,” she said, going on to note that this was not the first case involving a sex offender obtaining a child through surrogacy.
“Unfortunately this is not the first case of a sex offender procuring a child from a surrogate mother that we have come across; we fear this is the tip of the iceberg. Vetting of commissioning parents in surrogacy is virtually nonexistent and is not comparable with checks we see in adoption.”
Surrogacy Concern was launched in the UK as a non-partisan effort to expose the harms of surrogacy and egg harvesting, and the group has expressed consistent opposition to the liberalization of surrogacy laws around the world.
“Surrogacy is not a child centered act,” Gibson says. “Removing a child from their birth mother and primary safeguarding is cruel, unethical and as we see in cases such as this, potentially enabling child abuse. There is no safe or ethical form of surrogacy which could be delivered by ‘better regulation’: we need a global ban on surrogacy for all and we need it now. Children must come first.”
EDIT 07/28/2025: This article was amended to include comment from Surrogacy Concern.
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