SAINT-JOSEPH, France—Declared dead by a French court in 2017, Jeanne Pouchain has spent the past four years trying to escape a bewildering legal twilight zone and prove to officialdom that she is in fact very much alive. She says the experience has been devastating.
“My name was Jeanne. It still is Jeanne, after I’ve been declared dead in 2017,” says the 59-year old, smoking cigarette after cigarette. She breaks into tears at times when recounting her ordeal—and what she plans for when she will officially be “alive” again.
