A benefits cheat cafe owner has been jailed after she was caught on camera singing and dancing to a Mariah Carey hit - despite claiming disability living allowance. Ex-local government employees Lisa Annette White, 56, and Andrew Mark White, 56, ran two cafes and had a secret seafront apartment in Broadstairs, Kent.
Investigators from the Royal Borough of Greenwich found footage of Mrs White dancing around The White House cafe to Mariah Carey's "All I Want For Christmas Is You". She was was receiving disability payments after telling the council she needed oxygen tanks to aid her breathing, needed help dressing and a walking-stick indoors and a wheelchair outside.
Yesterday at Inner London Crown Court she sobbed throughout the thee-hour hearing and received 18 months imprisonment and her husband received nine months, suspended for two years. "She's dancing around. I can see why she's happy, if I was getting money for nothing, I'd be happy," said Judge Tudor Owen.
White was captured on CCTV struggling with a walking stick when applying for a new council house at the council's Woolwich Centre, but was enjoying her secret life on the south coast. The couple own 30 Grand Mansions, 30 Queen's Gardens, but Mrs White swindled the borough by claiming she shared a council flat with her 84 year-old mother in Eltham.
Mrs White pleaded guilty to nine counts of fraud, three of failing to notify a change in her medical circumstances and one count of money laundering. Mr. White admitted one count of aiding and abetting his wife make a false representation to get on the council's housing waiting list and laundering £12,800.
(excerpt from Mirror)
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