Patricia Johnson died with her floral-print suitcase still neatly packed and sitting in her apartment in Gambia, where it had sat for more than two years while she waited to come live with her daughter in the Bay Area.

America's doors remain effectively locked to the most desperate and in danger -- the tired, poor, huddled masses that the Statue of Liberty once beckoned to her shores. Some find it oddly symbolic that the landmark itself, the world's most famous icon of immigration and freedom, has been closed since the terrorist attacks.

Johnson, who was 92, had escaped her native Sierra Leone during the 1997 civil war and received permission to move to the United States before Sept. 11, 2001. But after the attacks, she and tens of thousands like her learned their approval was on hold while various security agencies conducted new background checks to ferret out any potential terrorists.

Weeks, then months, went by as Johnson -- in a one-room apartment in Gambia -- and her daughter Olive Briggs -- in her two-room Pinole apartment -- awaited further information. On July 3, Johnson died of advancing arthritis and a sudden illness.

"The worst was that they never told us what was the concern, why was there the holdup,'' said Briggs, who became a naturalized U.S. citizen earlier this year. "Did they seriously think this woman could possibly be a terrorist threat? They just kept telling us to wait.''

Briggs is not alone in her anguish. Hundreds of Bay Area families are still left to wonder and worry each day about relatives overseas who have been approved for resettlement but remain in a post-Sept. 11 bureaucratic limbo.

Briggs still lingers by the phone and mailbox hoping for information about her 64-year-old sister, Alicia, and her 20-year-old adopted daughter, Josephine, both of whom live in Gambia and still have refugee applications pending. Her concern runs especially deep for Josephine, because she turns 21 in January and might be forced to start the refugee visa application process from the beginning because she will no longer be considered a child.

A second adopted daughter, Alice Bockarie-Briggs, was also waiting in Gambia for a visa but eventually married, which made her ineligible for admission to the United States as a refugee.

Olive Briggs received news that her mother had died waiting to come to the United States. Chronicle photo by Kat Wade

Don Climent, the director of the San Francisco chapter of the International Rescue Committee, one of the nation's largest refugee relocation agencies, said Briggs' was one of the more heartbreaking cases he has learned of, though all are painful in their own way. About 300 families in the Bay Area have been affected by the new security requirements of the refugee admissions program, he said, adding that African countries have been among those most severely impacted by the additional background checks and delays for final interviews.

For the last two years, the United States has let in fewer than half the number of refugees it promised it would while government officials scrutinized the program.

A decade ago, the United States typically allowed about 130,000 refugees into the country each year. Only 28,421 refugees were admitted during the fiscal year that ended last September.

"Our tradition of being the leading place in the world to offer succor to those in need has served both refugees and us very well,'' Climent said. "But now our tradition itself is at risk of becoming another 9/11 victim.''

Statistics cannot do justice to the suffering that is behind them, said Lavinia Limon, executive director of Immigration and Refugee Services of America and the U.S. Committee for Refugees, a nonprofit resettlement agency in Washington, D.C.

"We know of people who have been murdered, who have died of diseases, who have been raped, deported or incarcerated. There are serious consequences when people are kept in this limbo, and this is happening all over the world,'' said Limon, who also served as the director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement during the Clinton administration. "These people are now in a security never-never land.''

Despite more than two years of delays and detailed background checks, not a single refugee applicant has turned out to be a security threat, said a State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

That does not surprise people like Limon.

"Really, no terrorist worth his or her salt is going to sit for 10 years in a refugee camp and wait to win the lottery,'' she said. "So either it is a question of bureaucratic inertia ... or perhaps even more scary, is the fact that people are more comfortable saying nothing than saying yes, because everyone is so afraid they are going to be the one to sign the visa for someone who might turn out to be a terrorist.''

As a result, America's doors remain effectively locked to the most desperate and in danger -- the tired, poor, huddled masses that the Statue of Liberty once beckoned to her shores. Some find it oddly symbolic that the landmark itself, the world's most famous icon of immigration and freedom, has been closed since the terrorist attacks.

When the government decides it wants to let refugees into the country, it can do it in short order.

Refugee advocates point to the fact that in September, the State Department chartered two planes to bring hundreds of Liberians who had been living in the Ivory Coast to the United States, skirting official regulations that allow only 35 refugees to come on commercial flights because of the elaborate paperwork processing that must be done for each.

"They managed to process these people in record time, so it displays what they are capable of if they decide to do it,'' Limon said, adding that the government was motivated to do so because it didn't want the admission numbers to be lower than the previous year.

A State Department official confirmed that the chartered flights did bring in "more than we normally do,'' and said it demonstrated the government's commitment to providing refuge.

"It wasn't uncommon before 9/11 for us to bring in charters with that number of people on board, and that's what we're striving for again, to get the program back to what it was pre-Sept. 11,'' the official said.

At the heart of the problem lies an inherent contradiction between two powerful arms of the administration -- the State Department, which is responsible for bringing refugees into the country, and the Department of Homeland Security, which seeks to safeguard the country by keeping out as many unknown elements as possible.

Asked to comment about the potential policy conflicts, a State Department official would say only that, "We're partners with the Department of Homeland Security and we want to bring as many refugees as the ceiling allows but at the same time ensure the safety of the American public and the safety of the workers helping adjudicate the cases to bring the refugees in.''

A few months ago, the State Department asked David Martin, a former general counsel for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, to study the refugee admissions process and recommend ways to streamline the process. Through interviews and field visits, he said, he is "guardedly optimistic" that increased staffing and improved processing procedures over the last year will result in more refugee admissions.

Meanwhile, people like Agnes Grimes, a 51-year-old Liberian refugee who is living in an Ivory Coast refugee camp, continue to await final security clearance. Her brother, Rufus Berry, lives in Oakland and sends $400 each month to support her family, including her husband, Orlando, a retired government auditor, and their four children. Grimes, 51, has stomach cancer and has been given little care and expired medications.

"Words are inadequate to describe what it is like, I feel so betrayed and let down and feel completely helpless,'' said Berry, who came to the United States as a student in 1987 and is now an accountant. "My sister is at the stage where she is losing hope.''

As vice president of the Bay Area-based Coalition for African Refugees and Immigrants, Berry said he personally knows at least 200 families who live with the daily stresses and strains of worrying about loved ones who are waiting to be relocated, and has met thousands more through his travels across the country.

They fear news similar to that which Berry received in 1999, when he learned that his brother, who he described as a "low-level civil servant,'' saw his four children shot to death by rebels before being kidnapped in Liberia. He has not heard from his brother since, and is certain he was also killed.

A former choirboy who once contemplated becoming a priest, the 38-year- old Berry said he relies on his faith to keep his hopes up that his sister will soon be cleared to come to the United States and build a new life with her family here. Until then, he keeps raising funds and gathering donations to send to Liberian hospitals because helping others helps him feel better.

Because the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security will not give status information to relatives directly, Berry and others rely on organizations like the International Rescue Committee to submit queries on their behalf -- which often go unanswered.

"The lack of communication is the hardest thing for people to deal with, because there are often no hard and fast answers,'' said Climent. "'It's heartbreaking. I have one woman who calls me at least four times a week asking about her daughter in Liberia, and there's often nothing I can tell her.''

Olive Briggs, whose mother died while waiting in Gambia, is haunted by the belief that her mother would not have died if she could have received medical care in the United States.

"She did not have Alzheimer's or any serious illness,'' said Briggs, 62.

©2003 San Francisco Chronicle

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