American Man Exploits Canadian Marriage Loophole to Wed Four Women
An American man has managed to marry four different women by exploiting a significant loophole in Canada's marriage licensing system. Jason Washington, a 46-year-old from New York, entered into multiple marriages despite the fact that bigamy—the act of marrying more than one person simultaneously—is illegal in both Canada and all 50 U.S. states.
How the System Failed to Flag Prior Marriages
Washington married at least three women in British Columbia and one in New York before his spouses discovered they were not his only wife. Two of the women, who spoke to CTV News under the pseudonyms Emma and Sara, revealed that the British Columbia government approved their marriage licenses without any issues, even though Washington was already married.
Emma stated emphatically that she would not have married Washington if his prior marriage licenses had been flagged. "One hundred percent, I wouldn't have married him," she told the outlet. "I wouldn’t have done any of these things." The couple married in 2014 after the former U.S. Marine proposed just one month into their relationship.
"He said all the right things, like he knew exactly what I needed," Emma recalled. Unbeknownst to her, Washington had recently pleaded guilty to "uttering a threat" in a different relationship and was going through divorce proceedings with another wife. Court records obtained by CTV News showed that his 2013 divorce proceedings in British Columbia were never finalized.
The Continuing Pattern of Deception
Four years after marrying Emma, Washington married another woman using the pseudonym Sara. Sara expressed shock upon discovering there were two other women legally married to her husband. "I was absolutely no idea there were other women," she told CTV News. "I was shocked that there were other women."
In 2021, Washington married his fourth wife in New York, where he currently resides. That marriage has since ended in divorce, and both Emma and Sara are now exploring legal avenues to separate themselves from Washington completely.
Systemic Vulnerabilities in Marriage Verification
The case has highlighted critical flaws in how Canadian provinces handle marriage license applications. Currently, Quebec is the only province that requires government officials to check for prior marriage licenses. The other nine provinces rely on applicants to be honest on their forms, which simply require checking a box indicating whether they are divorced, widowed, or never married.
Canadians can pay C$50 (approximately $36 USD) to search if their partners have been married before, but this requires the significant other's signature to authorize the search. Incorrectly filing a marriage form is technically illegal, but such offenses are rarely prosecuted. British Columbia's Ministry of Citizens Services approved more than 28,500 marriages last year alone.
Washington's Controversial Response and Criminal History
Despite the clear deception, Washington has attempted to shift responsibility onto his former wives. He told CTV News that investigating his relationship history was "a woman's job" and claimed, "I've always been up front, 100 percent, about who I've been married to and who I haven't." He added, "These are women I loved for many, many years."
When contacted by the Daily Mail, Washington simply stated, "I have nothing to say." His response to CTV News included profanity-laden outbursts, including calling the reporter a "f**king t***" and blaming his criminal conviction on "dissociative episodes from f**king combat."
This is not Washington's first encounter with legal trouble. He was previously incarcerated in Buffalo after killing a man in a drunk driving accident. In 2022, he was convicted of second-degree manslaughter for crossing a double yellow line on Seneca Street and crashing into another vehicle, killing 57-year-old Thomas Shoemaker. Washington and a female passenger were injured and hospitalized.
He pleaded guilty in October of that year and served just over three years in jail before his release in 2024. Military records reviewed by CTV News show Washington was court-martialed for "bad conduct" during his service from August 1997 to October 2001.
Calls for Systemic Reform
The case has sparked calls for reform in how marriage licenses are processed across Canada. Victims like Emma and Sara argue that the current system places an unreasonable burden on individuals to investigate their partners' marital histories, particularly when cross-border relationships are involved.
As bigamy remains a crime throughout North America, this case demonstrates how easily determined individuals can circumvent the law when systemic checks are inadequate. The emotional and legal consequences for Washington's victims continue to unfold as they seek to untangle themselves from marriages that were never legally valid from their inception.
