Suspended sentence for mother who claimed benefits using dead son’s name in ‘tragic case’

A 44-YEAR-OLD woman who pretended her dead son was still alive so she could claim his disability payment has been handed down an 18 month sentence - suspended for 18 months - in a case described by Judge Thomas E O’Donnell at the Circuit Criminal Court in Tralee as “sad” but also “bizarre”.

The court was conscious of “the extremely tragic background” but said it was hard to reconcile certain matters in the case in which Jean Anne McCarthy ensured that a disability allowance granted to her 16 year old son Dylan shortly before he tragically died in a car crash on November 1 was paid by the Department of Social Protection, Judge Thomas E O’Donnell said.

In late November she presented herself at the Bank of Ireland in Tralee with a young man whom she claimed was her son Dylan, so an account could be opened in Dylan’s name to receive the payments from the Department; the Department had also received written instructions from a person purporting to be Dylan.

The payments of €188 a week continued until a person, which turned out to be Ms McCarthy contacted the Department saying Dylan had now gone to Australia, and the payments should cease, the judge said.

“However, the Department became aware that he died in a road traffic accident on November 1, 2014,” Judge Thomas E O’Donnell recounted.

A handwriting analysis confirmed letters and other documents were in her hand writing.

Ms McCarthy , of Cois Coille, Tralee, pleaded guilty last September to 25 counts of theft on diverse dates etween December 3, 2014 and May 27, 2015 and of obtaining money by deception through the Bank of Ireland Castle Street, Tralee which was the property of the Department of Social Protection.

The facts of the case had already been given by Detective John Alfred, investigating garda. Defence barrister Richard Liston asked for leniency given the “tragic nature” of the case.

She was unemployed. She had been under doctor’s care because of her loss.

“This lady was not in a good place at the time and her thought patterns were skewed to say the least,” the judge said. She had no convictions before or since and had been co-operative.

“18 months is the appropriate sentence,” Judge O’Donnell said. Having factored in the mitigating circumstances he was suspending the sentence for a period of 18 months on her own bond.