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Woman to be deported after wrong turn at borderAssociated Press | Posted: Saturday, September 19, 2009 10:50 am
HELENA - A 26-year-old woman from Argentina who had lived in the United States illegally for six years faces immediate deportation after mistakenly heading the wrong direction when returning to California from Montana and crossing into Canada.
In an order issued Thursday, U.S. District Judge Charles Lovell wrote that by leaving the country, however briefly or unintentionally, Estafania Menendez subjected herself to immigration laws that allow for her immediate deportation.
Menendez entered the United States on a six-month travel visa in November 2002, but never left.
She met a man from Missoula and was in Montana to plan their wedding. When she left on Aug. 12 to return to California, she mistakenly drove north, not realizing she was going the wrong way until she got to the Canadian border.
A border agent told her to drive around a flag pole to turn around and re-enter the United States, but the U.S. agent said she could not return without facing deportation.