The State solicitor at Galway District Court said it was "bizarre" that after two men were caught defrauding the Western Health Board out of €52,000, the board continued to pay their respective spouses supplementary welfare allowances and rent allowances as before.
The two men, who worked as attendants in the carpark at University College Hospital, Galway, defrauded the Health Service Executive (then known as the Western Health Board) by using social security numbers which were not their own in order for their partners to claim rent allowances and supplementary welfare payments.
Olusola Ayodele Falegan, of Rathlaoi, Carthur Mór, Clybaun, Galway, and his next-door neighbour, Abayomi Lateef Adedeji, of Rathlaoi, Carthur Mór, Clybaun, Galway, admitted the offences. They were sent forward to the Galway Circuit Criminal Court for sentencing after Judge Mary Fahy refused to deal with the matter in the District Court.
The court heard that the two men had used a PPS number, which had been correctly issued to another person, to commit the fraud.
As a result, their partners claimed supplementary welfare allowances and rent allowances from the HSE. Olusola Falegan's partner received €30,406 in allowances, Abayomi Adedejii's partner received €21,781.
State solicitor William Kennedy said the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs was prosecuting the men solely for unlawful use of someone else's PPS number. He understood that while the HSE had made a complaint to gardaí, an unusual aspect of the case was that after both accused had been investigated and had ceased working, the HSE had continued to pay their spouses the supplementary allowances and the rent allowances, and were still paying them.
Referring to the spouses' applications for the HSE payments, Mr Kennedy pointed out that "rather bizarrely, the only thing taken into account is a person's means on the day of application. In this case, the men had been working for three years beforehand and this was not taken into account when their means were being assessed," he said.
Refusing jurisdiction, Judge Mary Fahy said, this was a rather sophisticated, convoluted fraud on the State involving over €52,000.
The judge observed that if a person won the Lotto on the day after he or she had made a claim for HSE allowances, they would still get them because it was based on a person's means on the date they made the application.