The controversy over teen father Alfie Patten: Who's the daddy?

The story of "child dad" Alfie Patten has lurched from soap opera to farce since it emerged last week that he had become a father at just 13 years of age.

When the Sun broke the story it was hard not to be shocked by the sight of the baby-faced teenager, whose voice has not even broken yet, posing with his daughter Maisie, which led to the Conservatives citing the case as an example of Britain's social decline.

Since then there's been a stream of tawdry revelations about the boy's family - and that of his 15-year-old girlfriend Chantelle Steadman. Some featured Alfie's absent father, "serial love cheat" Dennis Patten, who has had either (depending on which paper you believe) seven or nine children with different women. Other stories detailed family feuds, further teenage pregnancies and questioned whether Alfie was physically capable of fathering a child. Small wonder that the News of the World has compared the situation to Channel 4 drama Shameless - only with "the total absence of anything remotely funny".

By this weekend, two other boys had come forward to suggest they, and not Alfie, might be the father. Richard Goodsell, 16, and Tyler Barker, 14, told the News of the World that they had intercourse with Chantelle several times around the time she fell pregnant.

The families of all the boys involved are now demanding DNA tests to determine who really is the daddy, with Alfie's mother, Nicola Hill, telling the Sunday Mirror: "I don't believe it is his baby."

The paternity dispute has prompted one poster on the News of the World's website to mischievously suggest: "Anyone else think this could turn out like the scene in Spartacus where they all claim to be him. Lots of 13- to 16-year-olds standing up claiming i'm the Daddy!"

You might wonder why these other boys are suddenly so keen to take on responsibility for a baby. But if today's Independent on Sunday is correct, there's a fortune to be made from the story, with "at least 15 television companies locked in a fierce battle to make a documentary" about the story and media experts estimating Alfie "could earn up to half a million pounds".

Let's just hope this doesn't prompt a wave of copycat pregancies as 11 and 12 year olds across the country try to cash in.

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