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A Roseville grocery produce stocker received help from a local news station after he got notice of his own death and was unable to correct the mistake.


Steven Monno is among an estimated 12,000 Americans who are mistakenly declared dead by the Social Security Administration each year, an act which can create a host of problems, including financial difficulties, 


"I did not believe it at first when I found out," Monno said.


Monno, a cancer survivor with special needs who lives independently, learned of the problem when his tax returns got bounced back. The IRS wrote in a letter that they were unable to process his return because he "was deceased prior to the tax year.


"They told me I'm supposed to be dead," Monno said. "But if I was, I wouldn't be standing here."


His sister, Cindy McMurray, tried to help him fix the problem. But she faced numerous hang-ups and unsuccessful calls to various government agencies, so she reached out to KARE 11.


In order to help prevent fraudulent payments after people die, the Social Security Administration collects records of all deaths in the U.S., puts a death entry into its records and then shares that information with other federal agencies, including the IRS, Medicare and Medicaid. But the news station determined that the agency doesn't verify deaths before it enters them in its master database, known as the Social Security Death Master File.


About 2.8 million death reports are added to the database each year. Social Security officials estimate that mistakes happen less than 1 percent of the time.


But when mistakes do happen, it can wreak havoc on a person's life, because the agency also sells its records to credit agencies, banks and business groups. Victims have reported having trouble finding jobs, apartments and loans, among other problems.


A bill co-authored by U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin hopes to fix the issue of death errors.


Within a week after KARE 11 contacted the Social Security Administration, Monno was removed from the agency's Death Master File and given a letter showing he's no longer deceased.


"I showed them I'm not dead," Monno said.

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A Roseville grocery produce stocker received help from KARE 11 after he got notice of his own death and was unable to correct the mistake.

Social Security mistakenly declares Minnesota man dead

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