Repeat offender riles judge with lies and luxury holidays

A repeat offender from Hull has been given her just desserts by a judge exasperated by the luxurious holidays she took as a result of a five-figure benefit overpayment.

Over the course of nearly 8 years, the 50-year-old mother of two, Amanda White, claimed tax credits amounting to £34,774. She started her claim in May 2008, when she claimed to be a single mother, working 30 hours a week as a cleaner. In fact, she was living with a partner who worked away from home and had been financially connected to him since 1997, when they opened a bank account together, stating that they lived together. His income, combined with Ms White’s benefits, allowed her to take luxurious holidays, including trips to Majorca in 2014, and Egypt in 2015.

However, it was also her partner’s employment which led to the investigation into Ms White, after he nominated her both as his emergency contact, and the person who’d receive a benefit were he to die in service. While Ms White continued to deny that they lived together after opening the HSBC account, she came to the attention of benefit fraud solicitors when it was discovered that the couple had subsequently given the same address when dealing with a finance company in 2011.

In her pre-sentence report, White stated that she couldn’t identify any victims of her crime, to which Judge Simon Jack pointed out that hard working taxpayers, and people in genuine need of assistance, would disagree with that. Perhaps more alarming for the judge at Hull Crown Court was the fact that Ms White had two previous convictions for benefit fraud. In 1996, she was found guilty of making false statements to claim benefits, and in 2005 a second benefit fraud conviction resulted in 200 hours of unpaid work.

Ms White wept as she was sentenced to a year in jail, and maintained that her benefit claims were fair due to her partner’s regular absence, and her suspicion that he had another family elsewhere.