gibbleking
Old School Grand Master
tis is on yahoos front page ...should cheer you up a bit...
A dole-fiddling couple who lived the millionaire lifestyle in a £50,000 scam were rumbled after a photo of them relaxing on their yacht was posted on the internet. Skip related content
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Shashi Bacheta indulged her passion for scuba diving despite claiming to be too ill to get out of bed as she and Jeffrey Cole sailed halfway round the Canaries, India and the Atlantic on their £100,000 boat Kismet.
But what admiring fellow travellers did not know was the couple funded their trip by illegally claiming more than £50,000 in benefits.
They were only caught after they got chatting to two retired policemen who posted the picture of them on an internet blog which was then spotted by benefit fraud investigators.
Bacheta, 52, and Cole, 58, admitted 20 charges of fraud and false accounting and will be sentenced today.
Also being sentenced was Bacheta's 28-year-old daughter Anju, who helped her mother in the scam.
Bacheta, from Fforestfach, Swansea, admitted 16 charges of false accounting, fraud and deception between October 2002 and January 2008.
They included claiming to be jobless and failing to declare she was living with Cole at his home and failing to declare any of his assets, including his yacht Kismet.
Cole, from Sketty, Swansea, pleaded guilty to four offences of obtaining wrongful credits and false accounting, including claiming £12,000 by saying he was her landlord.
Yet the pair had worked - Cole was a post master in Clase, Swansea, while he gave Bacheta a job managing the newsagent side of the business.
Cole had bought Kismet legitimately with the business proceeds and properties he owned.
Their downfall came when they docked in Gran Canaria and met the retired police officers, who were enjoying a similar round-the-world adventure.
Bacheta and Cole happily posed for pictures looking anything but ill and out of work and the former officers posted the photo on a blog of their own voyage.
Back in Britain, fraud investigators at Swansea County Council had become increasingly suspicious of the pair but were struggling for firm evidence until, while doing an internet trawl for the Kismet, struck upon the blog and the photo.
Jeffrey Fish, an investigator for Swansea County Council, said: "They (the retired officers) had no idea they were a couple of benefits cheats. The photograph said it all."
A dole-fiddling couple who lived the millionaire lifestyle in a £50,000 scam were rumbled after a photo of them relaxing on their yacht was posted on the internet. Skip related content
Related photos / videos
Dole Cheats Sailed The World In Benefits Scam
Related content
* CCTV clue to drowning tragedy
* Bodies In Lake Are Mother And Daughter
* Mizen murder accused sobbed to police
* Related Hot Topic: Crime
Have your say: Crime
Shashi Bacheta indulged her passion for scuba diving despite claiming to be too ill to get out of bed as she and Jeffrey Cole sailed halfway round the Canaries, India and the Atlantic on their £100,000 boat Kismet.
But what admiring fellow travellers did not know was the couple funded their trip by illegally claiming more than £50,000 in benefits.
They were only caught after they got chatting to two retired policemen who posted the picture of them on an internet blog which was then spotted by benefit fraud investigators.
Bacheta, 52, and Cole, 58, admitted 20 charges of fraud and false accounting and will be sentenced today.
Also being sentenced was Bacheta's 28-year-old daughter Anju, who helped her mother in the scam.
Bacheta, from Fforestfach, Swansea, admitted 16 charges of false accounting, fraud and deception between October 2002 and January 2008.
They included claiming to be jobless and failing to declare she was living with Cole at his home and failing to declare any of his assets, including his yacht Kismet.
Cole, from Sketty, Swansea, pleaded guilty to four offences of obtaining wrongful credits and false accounting, including claiming £12,000 by saying he was her landlord.
Yet the pair had worked - Cole was a post master in Clase, Swansea, while he gave Bacheta a job managing the newsagent side of the business.
Cole had bought Kismet legitimately with the business proceeds and properties he owned.
Their downfall came when they docked in Gran Canaria and met the retired police officers, who were enjoying a similar round-the-world adventure.
Bacheta and Cole happily posed for pictures looking anything but ill and out of work and the former officers posted the photo on a blog of their own voyage.
Back in Britain, fraud investigators at Swansea County Council had become increasingly suspicious of the pair but were struggling for firm evidence until, while doing an internet trawl for the Kismet, struck upon the blog and the photo.
Jeffrey Fish, an investigator for Swansea County Council, said: "They (the retired officers) had no idea they were a couple of benefits cheats. The photograph said it all."
Just hope they don't have kids and produce more monsters to keep at our expense :evil: 
