Page 18 - IAV Digital Magazine #435

iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine
Spanish Woman Wants To Open Up Grave To Prove She's Alive
Juana Escudero knows she's alive. She just can't prove it.
Escudero, a 53- year-old woman from Alcala de Guadaira, a town outside of Seville in southern Spain, has been unable to renew her dri- ver’s license or go to the doctor since 2010 because var- ious government officers believe she’s dead -- the result of a seven- year-old clerical error.
On May 13, 2010, a woman in Malaga was declared dead and her information – including full name and date of birth – match Lezcano’s exactly. This caused their Social Security informa- tion to clash and Lezcano was sub- sequently declared deceased.
“[I have] suffered for more than six years,” she
told EFE, accord- ing to El Diario de Sevilla.
Escudero said she first learned of the error when she visited the emer- gency room and her primary care
physician checked her out.
“He looked at her, not knowing how to break it to her, and told her that according to Social Security records she was deceased,” her daughter, Marta, told the newspa- per, adding “the family has not found the funny side of this story for a long time now.”
The doctor still treated Escudero “because she knew me and knew my situation was urgent,” but that the error needed to be fixed sooner rather than later.
At first, Escudero thought it was just a computer error that could be fixed quickly at the Social Security offices. That was- n’t the case.
“They explained to me that someone probably made a typo or maybe it was a computer error. But we went to the treasury, to the courts...and everywhere I appeared as deceased,” she told the newspa- per.
When her husband passed away in 2011, she needed a certification of life to receive widow benefits,
but instead was told she could be charged with iden- tity fraud.
“On top of killing me, they find me, without hearing my story,” Escudero said, joking that she is dead to everyone but the banks, to whom she pays loans and mortgage on a regular basis. “On the government’s computers I am dead, but for the banks I am alive and kicking.”
In April 2016, she found out that a woman with her name and data had been buried six years prior in Malaga – about 127 miles away.
She said her daughter called the cemetery and confirmed the bur- ial date and that the remains has been transferred to an ossuary because mainte- nance fees had not been paid. She also con- firmed her moth- er’s social security and date of birth.
“'Look,' my daugh- ter told them, 'that person is my mother and she is here right next to
me,'” Escudero said. “Imagine the woman’s face at the cemetery.”
Earlier this month she filed a petition with Malaga courts to have the grave opened and has offered to do a DNA test – any- thing – to prove that the woman buried is not her.
Escudero says no one has explained to her how the woman has died, but believes that she has been con- fused with a sister with whom she has no contact and whose where- abouts are unknown. She said she has no con- nection to Malaga.
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