Woman says she fled to northern Ont. to escape Islamic militants, but court rules she faked evidence

A sign advising people that entrance to Canada via Roxham road is illegal is shown on the Canada/US border in Hemmingford, Que., Saturday, March 25, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes

A federal court has rejected a refugee claim from a woman who said she came to Sudbury with her five children after fleeing Nigeria to escape Boko Haram, a militant Islamist group.

The woman claimed Boko Haram wanted to force her to join, and she said she was wanted by Nigerian police for not reporting a fellow teacher who was involved in a same-sex relationship.

After several appeals, a judge with the Federal Court denied her appeal for refugee status, ruling that she changed her story over time to boost her claim and that some of the evidence she used was fabricated.

A decision dated Aug. 30 of this year outlines the history of the claim, which began in July 2018.

The woman said that her husband, a Muslim cleric, was being pressured in Nigeria to join Boko Haram and that "members of the group had threatened to kill him and his family if he did not join."

The woman said she and her children twice moved to other parts of Nigeria without her husband, before being attacked in September 2018 by people claiming to be from Boko Haram who said they were looking for her husband.

"After this attack, the principal applicant (the woman) and her husband decided that she and the children should leave for the United States," the court decision said.

"To pay for this trip, the principal applicant decided to sell the school she owned."

The woman and her children arrived in the U.S. on Sept. 10, 2018, then entered Canada illegally at the Roxham Road border crossing, a border between New York State and Quebec that has since been closed.

She claimed refugee status in Canada on Sept. 16, 2018. In December 2018, she said her husband called her and said he had joined Boko Haram and that she had to return and join them, as well.

The woman "also claimed that on Oct. 13, 2019, her brother called her from Nigeria to tell her that the police, her husband, and some members of the local mosque had just been to his home looking for her," the court decision said.

"The police wanted to question her about a teacher at her school who had engaged in same-sex activities in March 2018, an incident the principal applicant had known about at the time but did not report to the authorities."

But the Refugee Board of Canada said many parts of her story didn't add up. For example, she didn't mention being attacked by Boko Haram when she made her initial claim but added it to her story in March 2019.

Police letter was ruled to be fake

In addition, she had applied to come to Canada in April 2018 but had been rejected. And the supposed letter from police in Nigeria – which later turned out to be fake -- arrived less than a month before her hearing before the refugee board.

Her refugee claim was rejected Nov. 25, 2019, "on credibility grounds," the federal court said.

The Refugee Protection Division (RPD) of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada said the claim was rejected largely because she gave inconsistent accounts of her movements in Nigeria before she came to Canada.

For example, she said she decided to sell her school and leave for Canada after she was attacked in September 2018. However, sale documents showed the school was actually sold in August 2018, well before the alleged attack.

And an affidavit from her brother was fraudulent, as was the letter supposedly from the Nigerian police saying that they wanted to see her.

"Other affidavits relied on by the applicants were insufficient to establish the truth of the central allegations and did not overcome the credibility concerns relating to the principal applicant’s evidence," the court decision said.

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She appealed that decision and filed new affidavits that attempted to address the RPD's concerns. She also claimed that the decision denying her refugee status was biased, but her appeal was dismissed in September 2021.

That decision was based on the fact the information in the appeal was available to the woman before the first ruling, while other parts of the appeal "strayed improperly into argument" or were "irrelevant."

She then appealed that decision in December 2021, now arguing that her legal counsel didn't competently represent her. That appeal was also dismissed in January 2022.

A judicial review application was granted Sept. 21, 2023, but it upheld the original ruling that the woman's refugee claim was "not supported by credible and trustworthy evidence."

"The applicants have not identified any failures of rationality, misapprehensions of evidence, or other flaws that could call the reasonableness of the decision into question," the judge hearing the case said.

"Rather, their submissions effectively ask me to reweigh the evidence and reach a different conclusion."