No jail for benefits cheat - due to prison cost
A BENEFITS cheat has been spared jail – because the cost of locking him up for a year would be the same as the amount he swindled.
Karmal Mustafa dishonestly claimed £38,856.50 of income support, council tax and housing benefit while working over a seven-year period.
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But Judge Carol Hagen told Bristol Crown Court: "£39,000 is what it costs to keep one man in prison for a year. Do I wish to burden the state further with another £38,000 to £40,000, much as I think it is deserved?"
Instead the judge handed Mustafa a 24-week suspended sentence, ordered him to carry out 250 hours of unpaid work and pay £250 costs.
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The court heard 29-year-old Mustafa was using his dual income to support two families – one in his native Somalia and one in Bristol.
He told investigators the money he was sending overseas helped support his sick father – but told his barrister his father and mother had both been killed in front of his eyes in Somalia 14 years ago.
Simon Emslie, prosecuting, said Mustafa, of Lansdowne Court, Easton, fraudulently obtained £25,676.20 in income support between 2004 and last year.
He said that over the same time, Mustafa pocketed £10,297.49 in housing benefit and £2.882.81 in council tax benefit.
The court heard the benefits were claimed on the basis Mustafa was unfit to work, but he had actually had a job. He managed to evade detection because of inadequate employers' records and by giving different addresses, bank account and national insurance numbers, Mr Emslie said.
Mustafa told the Department for Work and Pensions he had worked since 2004 and he did not inform them because he was regularly sending £800 to £1,000 to Somalia to support his family, including his father, who had cancer.
The court heard he had paid back £200 in income support and £520 in council tax benefit.
Judge Hagen asked Paul Cook, defending: "If he was sending £800 to £1,000 to Somalia, why is he not paying that to the Department for Work and Pensions?"
Mr Cook said his client had only been able to do that because he was living off his fraudulent benefits, and sending his earnings out of the UK.
Mr Cook described Mustafa's early life in Somalia as "hell", and said he had seen his mother and father killed when he was aged 15, and seen his brothers and sisters killed a year later.
The court heard that in 2005 Mustafa married a girl from his village, who gave birth to twins who both died – one of them three days before the hearing.
Mustafa now has two children and one on the way with another woman, who came to the UK in 2007, does not speak English and is "utterly dependant" on him, Mr Cook said.
Judge Hagen asked: "Why is it that a man facing serious criminal charges embarks on a third child? It seems seriously irresponsible."
Mr Cook said: "He only intended one child." The judge replied: "He's a grown man. He can take his own preventative measures."
Comments
by tenpounds
Thursday, September 27 2012, 10:35PM
“We should bring his family over and sentance them to prision then deport them back for spending the proceeds of his crime,and when they scream for asylum send them to another country witch dosent give benifits,a place where they would have to work for there money,they should all be given food stamps not money for doing nothing.”
by harryreg_uk
Wednesday, September 12 2012, 2:11PM
“@BristolMark2, another good example -
A house down the road got burgled last week, if it was mine I'd get a crime no over the phone full stop, several cop cars and even a Scientific Investigation van turned up, give you one guess what country they were from?”
by harryreg_uk
Wednesday, September 12 2012, 2:06PM
“Is this the 1st thread where no one is even going to attempt to convince the rest of us what a valuable addition to our society people like this are?
Maybe even the softest lefty is finally getting their head out the sand and beginning to realise what a complete disaster this country is in - we have enough dregs of our own without importing the worlds!
Ethnic "majorities" like Somalians now control so much of the city I doubt this can ever be reversed? - it's too late - paying to feed the world will eventually run out of money, then what?”
by ANDYJRM
Wednesday, September 12 2012, 1:59PM
“@andyyandyy - about time we brought something like that in over here.
Solves the problem of staffing agriculture with it's low wages, provides employment for ex-servicemen & women, and makes jail something to be feared again.
I've got no problem whatsoever with prison farms, chaingangs etc - if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear.”
by BristolMark2
Wednesday, September 12 2012, 10:53AM
“Did anyone else see this news from the local police, posted on the same day as this article? http://tinyurl.com/9lm438m
So we have Mustafa, guilty of stealing £38,856, who gets 250 hours of unpaid work as his "sentence". Seward on the other hand, guilty of stealing £34,122, gets 18 MONTHS in prison. This looks very unbalanced, to put it mildly - could it possibly have had anything to do with Mustafa being an asylum seeker, and Maria Seward being a white British woman?”
by bartonhillbum
Tuesday, September 11 2012, 6:42PM
“All of these Somali are E.U. citizens therefor can come freely into the U.K. Just like French Dutch or German's or Polish people, as they (the Somali's) have lived in war torn Europe for over 2 years and so are granted a passport from the Country that they were settled in by the U.N. They come to the U.K. for simple reasons - free housing (within a few months - as they all seem to have children) free education, for the children, free health care, and of course the U.K. Government pays them to have childr. Which other E.U.Country allows imigrants to all this 'free' money and benefits ? That why we all the Romainian's and soon those from Croasia as for years we have had the Irish Travellers.
As for the Judge we can not sack her (mores the pity) BUT we as individuals can write to the Lord Chancellors Office as well as the Home Office and as individuals we can ask the Lord Chancellor to look at the sentance and re-examine it with a view to increase the sentance.
I am doing so, I just wonder how many others will ?”
by piledriver
Tuesday, September 11 2012, 5:47PM
“So, in a country with serious financial problems, we import people who seem largely unemployable with criminal tendancies who are also dishonest and draining the country of thousands?
OK I've got it and he can also produce children at a rate of knots, OUT OF TWO WOMEN who can't even speak English, who are born here, therefore British and who, no doubt, he will JUSTIFIABLY claim benefit.
You couldn't make it up.”
by Bristolexpat
Tuesday, September 11 2012, 10:31AM
“I really hope next time I'm up in Court I'm in front of "Judge" Carol Hagen....
You cant go wrong with that one...”
by andyyandyy
Tuesday, September 11 2012, 10:25AM
“Sheriff Joe Arpaio of the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office in Arizona is known as America's toughest sheriff because of his borderline fair treatment of prisoners in the Maricopa County Jail. Some of you may know about this sheriff and others may never have heard of him so let me fill you in a bit about him. He was elected sheriff in 1992 and is still the sheriff today in Maricopa County, Arizona. His claim to fame or infamy, depending on your own personal views is creating a "Tent City" in the parking lot of the county jail. This is where inmates are housed as the main prison building is full and he created the tent city to save taxpayers more than seventy million dollars for constructing a new building.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio has also re-instituted the chain gang so the prisoners will work for the county and thereby saving the county a lot of money as well. The duties of the chain gang include keeping roads clean, creating fire breaks and even burying impecunious people in local cemeteries. The inmates work six days a week, eight hours a day with Sundays off. He also instituted a chain gang for women so he could not be sued for discrimination and they work seven hours a day. Members of the chain gang wear the traditional black and white striped uniforms and a cap to protect them from the hot desert sun.
Other changes Sheriff Arpaio instituted is feeding prisoners twice a day and those meals consist of mainly bologna sandwiches and has brought the cost down for the county to about forty cents a day. Other sites have varied amounts but they all agree that the inmates pay for the meals themselves. He has banned cigarettes, pornographic magazines and weightlifting equipment because he does not want the prisoners to build their muscles to go out and commit more crimes when they are released. The heat inside these tents can reach temperatures of 150 degrees and when the inmates complain about the heat, he tells them that the soldiers in Iraq have to deal with that kind of heat daily and have to wear full battle dress uniforms and they have committed no crimes. He also tells them that if they don't like then stay out of trouble and don't come back.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio has cable television in the prison for inmates but they are only allowed to watch stations like Disney channel, CNN, and the Weather Channel. When asked why he has them watch the Weather Channel, he stated that he wants the prisoners to see how hot it will be the next day while they are working on the chain gangs. The inmates wear pink underwear because the white underwear with "Maricopa County Jail" stenciled on them was being smuggled out of the jail and sold on the streets. He says that pink is less manly in color and will less likely to be sold. In 2005, he instituted a mandatory English speaking class for non-English speaking inmates. The class is two hours long each day and lasts for two weeks. The reason for this is that prisoners housed in his jail must be able to speak English.”
by harryreg_uk
Tuesday, September 11 2012, 10:24AM
“@andygeezer - spot on about thousands cheating the system, a friend works in a doctors surgery in easton/eastville, there are many known (mostly Somalians but now the Romanians have cottoned on) that continuously change their names - some have at least 4 identities and therefore 4 lots of handouts - and the authorities are frightened to death to do anything in case of the "racism" shout - is it any wonder we're known as "the laughing stock of the world"?”