Another TV Show Winner Convicted of Fraud

     Tens of thousands of individuals, and probably more due to our recent economic slow-down, are on some form of public assistance, and within that group are some individuals whom out of need or/and greed do not report all their information as they are obligated to and therefore find themselves committing fraud. Whether intentional, or of ignorance a crime is committed when this occurs. These are usually petty amounts, but overall contribute to millions.

     This is not just an American situation, but a world-wide problem as can be seen in several posts over the past few weeks [click here], and [click here to view], where we spotlighted an English woman who was living in a mansion while on public assistance claiming five of her eight children were disabled when in fact they were very healthy, and in show business earning a living; and also a TV game show winner who was receiving disability benefits.

Today’s CrimeDiva is another European woman, Caroline Banana, 40, of Whitridge Grove, Bentilee, who was charged, convicted, and sentenced for wrongly receiving over  £6,100 in housing, tax benefits, and income support. This amounted to just  a little under $10,000 American dollars.

Ms. Banana, was lucky enough to become a contestant on the TV show Deal or No Deal, and was luckier when she won £95,000, in American dollars this is about $152,000.  She did not report this money and was later charged, convicted, and sentenced for fraud.  

Apparently, Ms. Banana had found work at several places such as:  at a chemists, hospital, and doctors’ surgery offices, but did not report them.  She was ordered to perform 215 hours of unpaid work. I think she lucked out there, also. I believe had she been here in America she would have went to prison.

I am going to add more to what happened to Ms. Banana; as our mission states we are here to inform via education. It is not our intent to shame these women, but to allow others to learn of their fate if they cross the crime line. The following are some additional consequences for Ms. Banana’s actions:

First, the “District Judge David Taylor, told Ms. Banana she had brought the large amount of media attention the case had attracted across the world upon herself.” He said “any honest person” would have reported the game show winnings soon after receiving them and said he believed Ms. Banana’s behaviour amounted to “a deliberate cover-up”.  He further stated, “Any offence of benefit fraud is never victimless,” and then,  “It harms every member of society who works and pays tax with the misfortune of having to claim benefit.” The judge said, “Ms. Banana had only pleaded guilty just before her trial last week and so only gave her “minimum credit” for that plea.”

Then, Ms. Banana was also ordered to repay £2,517 to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and £3,794 to Stoke-on-Trent City Council. She was also told to pay £350 in costs to the court. Ms. Banana will have to sell a £60,000 property in Turkey she had bought with her winnings in order to settle the debt.

And finally, if that’s wasn’t enough, the job offers that had been made were withdrawn after potential employers read about her case in the press.

As we see here, in the end Ms. Banana was not a winner, because her actions caused her to loss everything she had won, now she has a criminal records, lost opportunities for jobs and probably will not be able to receive public assistance again.  

Lesson to others, “Do the right things at all times!”

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