Brigitte Boisselier
A series of articles on the Raëlian Movement Founder • History Beliefs & practices Cloning (Clonaid) Funds Views on: Politics Economics Cosmology This box: view talk edit Brigitte Boisselier (born 1956), also known as Brigitte Roehr, is a French chemist and Raëlian religious leader best known for her claim to have overseen the creation of the first human clone. A native of Champagne-Ardenne, she studied chemistry in France and the United States, earning two PhDs. From 1984 to 1997, she lived near Paris and worked as a research chemist and a sales manager for Air Liquide. She embraced Raëlism in 1992; the group was unpopular in France and her conversion led to tensions with those around her. Five years later, she joined Clonaid, a Raëlian organization that sought to clone a human. After her service as their scientific director was publicized, she lost her position with Air Liquide and focused on cloning full-time. In late 2000, Clonaid announced that they had received a large donation to fund the cloning of a child, and that Boisselier supervised a team of scientists at a secret laboratory in the United States who would soon produce a human clone. For the next year, the project received media coverage—and regulatory suspicion—as Boisselier promised the imminent birth of a human clone. In late 2001, she announced that one had been born and that public evidence would soon be offered. This declaration received significant press coverage in the United States, and Boisselier appeared on many television programs. After a court in Florida launched a child welfare investigation, she stated that the cloned child's parents had withdrawn their offer to provide evidence of the cloning and would have no further public comment. No evidence of the cloning, or subsequent procedures reported by Clonaid, was ever offered, and the announcements were widely perceived to have been a hoax. In 2003, impressed with her management of Clonaid and public relations skill, Raël, the founder of Raëlism, announced that Boisselier would succeed him as the group's leader upon his death. In subsequent years, she has devoted herself to lecturing about the group's doctrines and serving as their spokesperson.