Crooked mayor helped out paedophile asylum seeker in benefit scam
A FORMER mayor is facing jail after being found guilty of helping a paedophile asylum seeker fraudulently claim housing benefit.
Malcolm Belchamber, the four- time mayor of Littlehampton, also forged a Home Office letter claiming that his unlikely friend from Sierra Leone had indefinite leave to remain in the UK.
The community stalwart and local businessman, who was awarded an MBE in 2004 for 40 years of service to the West Sussex town, now faces ruin.
Police are mystified why Belchamber, 70, befriended Osman Koroma, 32, and then broke the law to help get him a flat in the seaside town.
Koroma and his accomplice Max N’Gasa, 26, were jailed for 14 and 11 years respectively last year for grooming and abusing 12 underage girls at the flat rented to them by the local politician when he was an estate agent. The case rocked the town and led to claims that police missed opportunities to stop the sex predators who targeted children as young as 13.
Belchamber was convicted on two counts of fraud after a three- day trial at Hove Trial Centre which followed the police inquiry into Koroma and N’Gasa. The charges included writing a fraudulent letter for Koroma which said that his rent had gone up so he could claim increased housing benefit.
The former estate agent had to be restrained by an officer in court after jurors delivered their verdict when he stood up in the dock and shouted: ‘What part of, “I didn’t do it” didn’t you understand?’
The jury had heard that the forged documents were found in a wardrobe when police raided Belcham- ber’s home in late 2014. They revealed the pair had a close friendship, and there were even photographs of them together during a family day out at the zoo.
Belchamber had also let Koroma stay in a room above his offices, which led to his dismissal from the estate agents.
But Belchamber insisted that Koroma was merely a tenant whose flat he visited when ‘things needed fixing’ and that he had loaned him money ‘once or twice’.
Following the guilty verdicts, Judge Christine Henson QC ordered Belchamber to return to court next month for sentencing and warned he should expect to go to jail. ‘The first offence of fraud clearly passes the custody threshold,’ she said.
Speaking after the hearing, Detective Constable David West described the relationship between Belcham- ber and Koroma as inexplicable. He said: ‘Why he did it is still the elephant in the room. He spoke of Koroma in very glowing terms – it goes beyond a friendly relationship. It was a very odd and dubious relationship.
‘He befriended Koroma when he was an impressionable man just arrived in the UK. He gave him financial and personal support and he had a close personal bond with him.’
The now retired police officer said that Belchamber even offered to be godfather to Koroma’s son when he was threatened with prison for an earlier offence.
He described Belchamber’s attitude towards the authorities throughout the sensitive inquiry as ‘denial and defiance’. He added: ‘He regards himself to be above all this. He never expected to be charged and brought to account.’
Belchamber, still an independent Littlehampton councillor, is the president of Littlehampton swimming club and a senior figure in its twinning association, bonfire society and sports field. Asked to explain his actions, Belchamber, who lives in a £300,000 home with his wife Shirley, 76, said: ‘You’ll only distort it.’
‘A very odd and dubious relationship’