Mother of six barred from returning to Canada has died in Turkey, lawyer says

A Canadian mother of six who was deemed a security risk and refused permission to come home by the federal government has died suddenly in Turkey, her lawyer says.

Lawrence Greenspon said he's been told his client was found dead in a cell in a Turkish immigration centre sometime during the night of Oct. 16-17.

The 40-year-old woman, known publicly by her initials F.J., was trying to get herself home to Canada and had somehow managed to escape a detention camp in northeastern Syria for ISIS suspects and their families, Greenspon said. 

"This was a wholly unnecessary tragedy that occurred," he told CBC News. "I have no doubt it's the end result of an incredibly un-humanitarian policy by Global Affairs Canada.

"I have no doubt that if she had been repatriated with her children that she would still be alive today."

Global Affairs has not yet responded to Greenspon's claim. The department said it is aware of reports of the woman's death and would not share any more information, citing privacy concerns.

Two other Canadian lawyers and a senator have sent a letter to Global Affairs Canada (GAC) calling on the federal government to launch its own independent investigation into a death they say has given rise "to a number of troubling questions."

In May, the federal government repatriated the woman's four boys and two girls from al-Roj in northeastern Syria, where F.J. had been held for five years.

She wasn't allowed to join her children on the repatriation flight to Canada, Greenspon said, because the federal government said it didn't have the "ability to manage her behaviour once she gets back to Canada."

Greenspon said he had been challenging the government's refusal to repatriate the woman through a judicial review in Federal Court, arguing that Ottawa had not presented "a genuine excuse for not bringing her home" since other women had been repatriated from the same camp in al-Roj and had been managed through terrorism peace bonds. 

"[The federal government] ... said was she's a security risk, and we don't have the ability to manage her behaviour once she gets back into Canada," he said. "So I knew that to be completely false, given that we brought eight other Canadian women back to Canada, some of whom are under peace bond conditions ...

"So for GAC to say she's a security risk and we can't manage her behaviour is nonsense ..."

That judicial review ended, Greenspon said, when the woman escaped the camp and fled to Turkey in an attempt to obtain emergency travel documents and get back to Canada.

Greenspon said F.J. was arrested in Turkey and charged with being a member of a terrorism group. He said she was acquitted in a criminal hearing on Oct. 15 in Turkey and was transferred to an immigration holding centre, where she was later found dead.