A Bedford mother of five who swindled more than £76,000 in benefits over five years has been spared jail for the sake of her young family.
Judge Barbara Mensah told 35-year-old Emma Brown that "her children would suffer most" if she went into custody.
Brown had failed to notify the authorities that her partner had moved in with her, and kept up the lie from January 2004 until June 2009, when the fraud was uncovered, said prosecutor Andrew Morton.
And it comes to court in 2011.
She pleaded guilty to two charges of failing to notify a change of circumstances and four charges of making false statements to obtain benefit on Friday 11 March. Brown was given a nine month prison sentence suspended for 12 months with supervision and 150 hours unpaid work.
Mr Morton told Luton Crown Court that she had initially had a genuine claim for benefit but the Department and Work and Pensions later discovered that in 2004 her partner had given her address to his new employer.
Other investigations were made with banks and employers and surveillance was kept outside the house.
He said she had been overpaid £52,397 in income support and £24,422 in housing and council tax benefit.
Mr Seghin Kong, defending, said: "This is a source of heart breaking shame. There is no evidence of a lavish life style, and she really just buried her head in the sand." Poor dear. He said she was repaying the benefit at £74 a month.
Judge Barbara Mensah told Brown; "The courts take these offences seriously because the victim is the public purse and the rest of the community.
"Custody is the normal starting point as a warning to anyone else who is thinking of committing this type of offence. The public should not think that by not sending you to prison means the courts are going soft, because they most certainly are not.
"The only reason I am not sending you to prison is your personal circumstances and your very young family who would suffer most. It is difficult to see how this vast sum of money is every going to be repaid."
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