The State : Mother’s Visit Just in Time

A cancer-stricken Vietnamese student who fled his native country in a boat seven years ago died in San Jose within days after seeing his mother for the first time since he left. The father of Nguyen Ngoc Anh, 20, said his son died of a rare spinal cancer Thursday at Valley Medical Center. His father, Nguyen Van Ly, said the death occurred just after the boy’s mother had “leaned over him and told him she loved him.” It would usually have taken years for the family to be legally reunited, but diplomats in the United States, Vietnam and Thailand gave special treatment to the case of Anh, who developed the fatal cancer that left him paralyzed for the last year.