POINT ROBERTS, Washington — A Canadian woman who had lived in this U.S. exclave for 14 years has died at home after refusing hospital care because she feared deportation proceedings against her, her son and her immigration lawyer say.
Source: The Canadian Press
Paige Adamson, 61, was a Canadian citizen and a U.S. permanent resident who had lived in Point Roberts since 2012. Point Roberts is cut off from the rest of Washington state and can be reached by land only by travelling through British Columbia, Canada, and health care in the community is limited, The Canadian Press reported.
In September, Adamson was returning home from a birthday dinner in Tsawwassen, B.C., when U.S. border officials held her for hours and questioned her about voting in the United States, according to The Canadian Press and Cascadia Daily News. Authorities allege she voted illegally in a state election in 2018 and started deportation proceedings against her. Adamson told reporters she never voted in a federal election and did not recall voting in a state election, and she denied knowingly registering or voting.
Source: Cascadia Daily News via Washington House Democrats roundup
Her son, Dylan Adamson, said his mother fell at home and refused to be taken to a hospital because she was afraid of crossing the border — and of being detained or prevented from returning to the United States. He said he learned of her fall only after speaking with a firefighter who attended the scene of her death last Sunday, within a week of the fall. 'Just because of a vote, my mom is dead. Just because of a stupid technicality, my mom is dead,' he told The Canadian Press.
Her Blaine immigration lawyer, Len Saunders, also said she had avoided seeking medical care in Bellingham, Washington, after her fall because she feared what would happen at the border, according to reporting carried by Global News. The Whatcom County Sheriff's Office said she died of what appeared to be natural causes, KMRE reported; an official cause of death has not been confirmed in the reports, and this story does not claim the fall itself caused her death.
Cascadia Daily News reported this week that Whatcom County is, in its words, 'unequivocally' underprepared for a jump in deportation efforts, and that attorneys have heard from other permanent residents questioned about voting — including a disabled truck driver who has lived in Washington with his American spouse for decades and a Filipino green card holder in Point Roberts who now worries about being effectively trapped in the exclave. Adamson's immigration hearing had been set for November in Seattle.