1969 Police Log Unlocks Uxbridge Woman's Passport

Christine LaChance spent weeks trying to prove something the state had never fully documented: that she was born in Massachusetts on Nov. 4, 1969. The Uxbridge woman said her passport application was held up because her birth certificate was incomplete and had been filed years after her home birth in Medway. A decades-old Medway police report, retrieved this spring, supplied the missing record. On May 14, LaChance said her passport had been approved and that she could resume plans for a trip to Canada. ### Why did a 1969 birth record become a passport problem in 2026? LaChance said the issue surfaced after she applied for a passport to visit the Canadian side of Niagara Falls. A trip to the U.S. side last year had prompted her to plan the cross-border visit, but the application ran into trouble because the birth certificate she held did not fully satisfy the documentation request, according to local reports. (wbznewsradio.iheart.com) The U.S. Department of State says passport applicants normally submit primary evidence of citizenship, such as a certified U.S. birth certificate, and must provide secondary evidence if primary evidence is unavailable or insufficient. The department also says applicants who receive a request for more information must respond within 90 days for processing to continue. (article.wn.com) ### What was wrong with her birth certificate? LaChance told WBZ NewsRadio that she was born at home in Medway and did not receive a birth certificate until she was 16. The document was marked as a delayed return of birth, reflecting that the formal record was not completed until 1986, she said. (travel.state.gov) Nov. 4, 1969, was the birth date cited in local coverage, which said Medway police officers delivered her at the family home before she was taken to Milford Hospital, now Milford Regional Medical Center. Local reports said she did not learn the certificate had been completed incorrectly until March, after applying for the passport. (wbznewsradio.iheart.com) ### How did Medway police end up with the record she needed? Medway police had kept a report from the night of the birth, according to the local accounts. That document recorded the home delivery and became the piece of evidence LaChance needed to support her passport application. LaChance told WBZ NewsRadio that she had tried other routes first, including medical records, but came up empty. “Everything is destroyed and gone,” she said, describing the search for supporting documents from 1969. (article.wn.com) ### Why would a police report matter decades later? The State Department says secondary evidence can be used when an applicant cannot provide acceptable primary citizenship evidence. (wbznewsradio.iheart.com) The agency’s guidance points applicants to additional records when a birth certificate on file is missing or does not resolve the question. In LaChance’s case, the Medway police report appears to have served as that supporting record, based on the timing described in local reports and her statement that the passport was approved after the document was found. That is an inference from the sequence reported by local outlets; the State Department did not publicly comment on her individual file. (travel.state.gov) ### Who else preserved the paper trail? Medway Town Hall and the police department were central to reconstructing the record, according to the local reporting. The story turned on the survival of a municipal paper trail from 1969 and a delayed birth filing from 1986. Milford Regional Medical Center was identified in local coverage as the hospital to which LaChance was taken after the home birth, though LaChance said older medical records were no longer available. (wbznewsradio.iheart.com) ### What happens next for LaChance? LaChance said on May 14 that her passport had been approved. (article.wn.com) The next step she identified was a trip to the Canadian side of Niagara Falls, the visit that prompted the application in the first place. (wbznewsradio.iheart.com)