A Ghanaian woman who died trying to walk across the border into Canada has been quietly laid to rest just short of her destination.
Mavis Korkor Outeye had been trying to travel to Toronto to visit her daughter and newborn granddaughter in May.
Mavis’s daughter, Peace Otuteye, from Toronto, and her husband, Dick Otuteye, from Ghana, received visas to travel to the U.S. for her June 28 burial in Hallock, Minn.
They flew with their baby girl from Toronto to Winnipeg, then drove down for the private graveside service. They asked reporters not to attend.
Plans are still in the works for a traditional memorial service in the U.S. Family members from Ghana said they hope to attend, but they’re having problems getting travel visas.
Mavis’s body was found in a watery ditch just less than a kilometre from the Manitoba border on May 26.
This is the ditch where Mavis Otuteye was found. It’s in a farmer’s field in Minnesota, less than one kilometre from the Canadian border. (Karen Pauls/CBC)
U.S. border patrol and sheriff’s officers went out on ATVs and in a helicopter to search for her after receiving a call about a missing person.
The medical examiner’s office has not publicly released an official cause of death but preliminary results suggested hypothermia.
While the days were warming up, the nighttime temperature was dipping to nearly freezing at the time Otuteye went missing. Her body was found in a watery ditch and she wasn’t wearing appropriate clothing for the weather.
Family members are still looking for information about her death. In particular, they want to know who dropped her off south of the border.
She had a bad back and would not have been able to walk across wet and muddy fields, especially in the dark, they said.
The Kittson County sheriff’s office has not provided any updates on the investigation.
When Otuteye’s body was found, police said she was 57.
However, Mavis was born March 3, 1969, in the greater Accra region of Ghana, an obituary in the Kittson County Enterprise says.
She studied dressmaking and fashion, then designed and sewed custom clothing for customers in Ghana and the U.S. She also distributed health supplements.
She had been living in Maryland under a visitor visa that expired in 2006, CBC News learned.
The Ghanaian communities in Winnipeg, Toronto and Minnesota have been supporting the family.
They set up a GoFundMe account to try to raise funds to send her body back to Ghana. So far, just over $1,000 has been raised of the $15,000 goal.
Otuteye is the only known death as hundreds of people have crossed the border on foot since Donald Trump was elected president last fall, fearing his anti-immigration stance.
New numbers have not yet been released for June, but as of May, 583 people had been intercepted by RCMP in Manitoba alone.
Immigration experts say Mavis Otuteye would have qualified to enter Canada legally at an official border crossing under the family member exception of the Safe Third Country Agreement.
The baby granddaughter she was trying to visit is a Canadian citizen, which would have allowed her to meet that qualification.
