remember much about his childhood. He stated that he was possibly born in 1963 in England where he was later adopted and brought to Canada. His adoptive parents told him he had been born in Toronto and that his biological parents were from the Caribbean. He did not remain in contact with his adoptive parents. He was later detained for lack of identity documents. He remained in detention for almost three years until he was released by a Board Member who found that his continued detention could become indefinite. Upon release, Mr. Rooney was ordered to report every month to CBSA. When stateless persons in this situation are released from detention, they are typically required to report regularly to CBSA authorities in their jurisdiction, amongst other conditions, and are thus restricted from traveling within Canada. However, if they advise of an address change in advance, they may receive permission to report to a different CBSA office. According to statistics provided by the Canadian government, 167 stateless persons were removed from Canada to different countries, including the U. S., Vietnam, Lebanon, Kuwait and Kosovo (top five removal destinations) between 2012 and September 2017. Boris’ story in many ways represents the journey stateless people encounter. Boris was born in the U.S.S.R. When the Soviet Union dissolved, he was living in the U.S. and was not aware that there was a time limit imposed on former U.S.S.R. citizens to claim Russian citizenship. Boris missed the deadline and discovered he was stateless. Once he realized that he did not possess any identity documents, he was forced to purchase fraudulent documents, which is how he entered Canada. “I left Soviet Union. That was 1991. And since then it’s like okay, I’m a free man. That’s it! I don’t need anything else but to get the status and live here and somehow that was the mentality, once you in States you free, don’t really need anything except driver’s license. So basically that’s how I lived until 2000 but once the Soviet Union collapsed, which basically was between 1993 to 1998, the former citizens of Soviet Union, they had a window of opportunity, I think about two years, to claim their citizenship with Russia or with the countries they considered to be suitable. And I didn’t tell them no, I just recently find out about that so I did not claim my citizenship and that pretty was much it”. [Boris] In 2009, after three years of residing in Canada without legal status Boris went to the Canadian immigration authorities and requested assistance in regularizing his status. He wanted to apply for a work permit, but he was not permitted to do so, and was encouraged to file a refugee claim. Without the assistance of a lawyer, Boris submitted a claim for refugee status which was denied in 2011. He did not file a request for H&C residency as he was not aware of this option. “But unfortunately, it’s only one choice we [non-resident stateless persons] have.[…] Going for refugee [status]. […] I didn’t want to be claiming for refugee. I [would like to] be given some kind of choices [to apply for a work permit].” [Boris] 17