Pray plea sees curfew altered
BENEFIT CHEAT’S HOURS CHANGED DURING RAMADAN
A BENEFIT cheat has been allowed to change her curfew hours so that she can pray during Ramadan.
Sami Farooq appeared in court last month, after claiming more than £10,000 she was not entitled to.
The 50-year-old’s claim for Disability Living Allowance was legitimate from the outset.
But, when her poor health improved and she gained a job with a firm of woollen spinners, she failed to tell anyone.
Farooq, of Sullivan Close, in Crosland Moor, pleaded guilty to failing to notify the Department for Work and Pensions of a change of circumstances affecting her entitlement to a benefit.
Kirklees magistrates described the offence, committed between January and October in 2014, as “serious”.
They sentenced her to an 18-week curfew, running between the hours of 7pm and 7am, as punishment.
But Farooq appeared back before magistrates and asked them to change her curfew hours for the month of Ramadan.
Through an interpreter, she explained: “It’s my honourable request to change the hours.
“It’s only for one month, but during this month there is extra prayer and I have to go to classes.”
Magistrates were told that she wished to go to the mosque to read her prayers, which finished later during the Holy month.
Farooq said she would expect to be home by 11pm most nights.
Magistrates agreed to vary her curfew so that it ran from 11pm until 9am, from May 5 until June 6.
From June 7 until July 20, she must be inside for the original curfew hours of 7pm to 7am.
Magistrates added an extra two days to her curfew, to reflect the shorter hours she will be inside during Ramadan.
Farooq asked if she could get in later on other days outside the religious festival, but the court refused.