Karen Balogun, 25, was given a four month custodial sentence for benefit fraud, suspended for 12 months, plus 150 hours community work, report Croydon Council. We're not told how much was involved.
The investigation began in 2008. Officials found that she had not declared that she was married when claiming for council tax and housing benefits. She was also found to have been making extra claims for a child who had died.
They were alerted by the council's student support services after she gave inconsistent information to support a student loan application.
The court heard how Mrs Balogun (nee Lakidi) married Olanrewaju Balogun in Nigeria in 2005, but he had been refused entry to the UK. However, the Home Office received information that he was back in the country working as an electrician in central London.
During interviews Mrs Balogun claimed that the man living with her in a flat, in London Road, was a new boyfriend who happened to have the same name as her husband. She also claimed that the name on her children's birth certificates was her also her boyfriend's.
Last year immigration officers visited her new address in Bromley and discovered her husband living there. He subsequently left the country in November 2008.
Mrs Balogun told the court she was doing a nursing course and was hoping to go to university in January. She also stated she was intending to divorce her husband.
She said the reason for claiming for her child two months after he had died was due to the distress she was under at the time having had to agree to switch off his life support machine on medical advice.
On deciding sentence Judge Daniel Flahive said he had considered an immediate custodial sentence for stealing money from the public purse and failure to comply with a previous community order but took into account her guilty plea and the fact that she had two young children.
Councillor Sara Bashford, cabinet member for resources and customer services, said: "It has never been more important for councils to fight fraud. Every year hundreds of thousands of pounds are lost to benefit cheats who are depriving those who really need the help by diverting funds into their own pockets.
"All too often people think that they can cheat the system and nobody will notice but as this and the dozens of other successful prosecutions in Croydon show, you will be found out. Not only will you then have a criminal record you will have to pay back all the money dishonestly claimed."
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