A Maryland woman is picking up the pieces after a careless mistake led to her legally being declared deceased. According to NBC 4 Washington, it wasn’t until Nicole Paulino went to renew her license that she even discovered the error.
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Back in November 2024, the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration (MVA) told Paulino she couldn’t renew her license because she had been declared dead. “I got a little frightened, I’m not gonna lie, and surprised, because I am alive. I’m here,” Paulino told NBC News.
She also received a letter from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) saying she was a “deceased taxpayer.” And if that wasn’t enough, because she had been marked deceased, Paulino’s health insurance was canceled for her and her three children.
“This really, really messes up my life,” Paulino continued. With that, her medical bills began piling up, preventing her from meeting basic medical needs such as buying inhalers for her asthma, according to NBC.
After much investigation into the matter, Paulino received a call from the Social Security Administration (SSA) saying she was mistakenly marked dead because of a simple typo.
The representative told Paulino an employee at a funeral home meant to report someone else dead but got a digit wrong in their Social Security number. This one digit mistake resulted in Paulino’s number being recorded, sending the mother of three down a path filled with confusion and frustration.
“It’s affected my health, my mental health,” she said. The government didn’t correct this mistake until Jan. 14, 2025 when the SSA admitted to the clerical error, according to the New York Post.
In a statement sent to NBC, the SSA said its records are “highly accurate.” Additionally, the statement revealed that of the 3 million and more death reports received each year, less than one-third of one percent have to be corrected.
This means that every year, about 10,000 official death reports are actually incorrect. So, Paulino’s unfortunate luck is not unique to her alone. “This happens almost on a daily basis,” attorney Joseph McClelland told NBC back in 2022. “The impact is the worst impact you can have on your credit report,” he continued.
Now that Paulino has been revived, the mother of three is getting her life and the lives of her children back on track.
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