benefit fraud...urgent advice plz!

mummy26

hi i am in need of some advice..

my younger sister whos 24 has got herself in some bother.
she has been on jsa for a year and has been suffering from severe depression since her teens. so has been in and out of employment for ages due to this.
last year she found a job and unknown to us she was still claiming jsa and did not notify them, she was in the job for few months and left. however months later she recieved a letter askng her to come for interview as they found out about her job. she owed jsa about £2000 and luckily was told to she just pay it back bit by bit however last week she recieved a letter summoning her to court. we only found out last night from her as she has been keeping it from the family. obviously shes been silly and reckless about it all. but she is so depressed over this and it has really been worrying as she doesnt eat and locks gerself in her room and is so worryng seeing her like this, shes convinced she will go to prison and is distraught. im not sure what will happen now? any advice?

HappyMJ

£51.85 per week over 9 months adds up to about £2,000. That's a long time... She won't go to jail...She'll just be made to pay it back over the next few years.

mummy26

think that included the fine the added on...thats why im thinkng if shes been fined why summon her to court months later?

AsknAnswer2

Nobody can say for certain what a court will decide but for the sum of the overpayment (£2000) the court cannot impose a custodial sentence. The worst that can happen for a fraud with an overpayment of this sum is a fine or community order.

They have no option but to refer for prosecution where an overpayment is in excess of £2000. There may also be other factors which meant that they had to refer for prosecution.

Benefits_Bod

There are circumstances where working is, in itself, not a bar to JSA. For example, was it part time? What were the level of earnings?

With that in mind, I cannot emphasise enough the importance of the following:

1) Your sister must get a solicitor dealing in criminal law.

2) No matter what the solicitor says, it is equally important that your sister instructs, indeed INSISTS, the solicitor obtains the services of an expert witness familiar with social security law.

The latter is important because the expert witness will then be able to advise on whether the DWP has:

- taken into account all relevant facts and FULLY considered the law relating to entitlement

- not incorrectly removed entitlement for periods where there was valid entitlement

- followed the correct decision making process and issued valid notification letters

- correctly calculated the alleged overpayment.

The above considerations are not simply accounting matters - an accountant, or similar, won't normally have anything like the depth of knowledge that is necessary in order to properly advise on entitlement matters.

Further, an expert witness will be able to advise on whether there were any other benefits your sister *could* have been entitled to had she claimed. This is important because such benefits are offset for the purposes of sentencing. For example, say the £2,000 overpayment is correct, but your sister would have been entitled to £2,000 (or more) had she claimed a disability benefit such as DLA. The overpayment would still be recoverable in itself under civil / social security law, but the amount considered for sentencing purposes would be zero - no loss to public funds. As it happens, I agree with the other posters that based on the info given so far, your sister won't be sent to prison in the event she is found guilty.

This may be sobering: in over 80% of cases alleged benefit fraud I have personally had involvement with, the amount of the overpayment stated by the DWP and/or LAs has been wrong - sometimes by £thousands.

Oldernotwiser

It always puzzles me why people describe a criminal offence as "silly"!

davsidipp

forget the £2000 sum mentioned there is no set amount b4 prosecution.

AsknAnswer2

No there is no set amount - it depends on all factors of the case. If the overpayment is below £2000, they can still refer for prosection due to other factors. However if the overpayment is in excess of £2000, they must refer it to the prosecution division.