A MAN who dishonestly claimed more than £35,000 in income protection insurance by claiming to be ill, has been jailed by a judge at Newport Crown Court.
Stephen Shaw carried out what Judge Martin Fitton QC called "a consistently deliberate" fraud, while claiming to be suffering from depression and anxiety that rendered him housebound.
But the 55-year-old, from New Street, Pontnewydd, Cwmbran, was working part-time as a DJ and playing in a band - and he is now beginning an 18-month jail sentence.
Prosecuting counsel Jason Howells told the court that Shaw, who pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing, claimed £35,279.29 from employment benefits company Unum Limited from January 1 2013-January 4 2016, by claiming to be unfit to work due to ill health.
He had worked for Owens Corning UK Holdings Limited and was part of a group income protection insurance policy administered by Unum. In November 2001, Shaw made a claim, subsequently accepted, stating he was unable to work due to depression and anxiety.
In February 2006, his "employment was terminated" said Mr Howells, but he continued to receive an income through the Unum policy.
In January 2015 Shaw told Unum he remained housebound and was not looking for work, but four months later Unum received a report stating that he had not seen his GP about his depression since October 2012, and had failed in January 2013 to keep an appointment with the primary care mental health team.
He maintained in a subsequent Unum questionnaire that he suffered from depression and anxiety, and had no other source of income.
But investigators and a surveillance team subsequently discovered that he was DJing under the name Stevie Shaw and was involved in a comedy band called Sticky Fingers.
Shaw last year maintained, in a further Unum questionnaire, that he had the same medical conditions and was housebound.
But Mr Howells said a report of more surveillance, including video, from March 10-12 2016 "confirms Shaw was seen active, out and about, and shopping."
"On the evening of March 11 he was playing keyboards in a club in Cardiff."
Investigations also confirmed he had been a DJ at a club in Cardiff for seven years.
In April last year Shaw was told his claim was fraudulent and payment was stopped.
Defence counsel John Stokes told Judge Fitton that, contrary to findings in a probation service report, Shaw is "fully remorseful."
He added that "there has been a crumbling of his mental health over a number of decades", that Shaw was set to lose his home in order to pay back the money, and that he would be "genuinely at risk" in prison.
But Judge Fitton concluded that Shaw told the probation service nothing that indicated "a degree of remorse.
While accepting the origin of Shaw's claim as honest, and acknowledging his history of depression, Judge Fitton said that by late 2012 he was not as ill as he was claiming, and had been dishonest in saying he was housebound.
"This was sustained over a period of three years - a consistently deliberate fraud for the purpose of financial gain," he said.