Benefits fraudster 'too weak to lift a phone' busted after running 10k race and climbing over walls

A man who told benefits assessors he lacked the strength to pick up his mobile phone or unscrew a bottle cap has been sentenced after fraudulently pocketing £7,625.68 in Personal Independence Payment.

Ryan Scott, 39, claimed a workplace accident had rendered him virtually incapable of everyday tasks, including lifting a saucepan, sitting upright, or walking further than 20 metres.

However, a DWP fraud investigation exposed his assertions as entirely false.

Scott, from Torquay, Devon, appeared at Exeter Magistrates Court, where he was given a community order and ordered to pay £360 covering fines, costs and a victim surcharge.

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Investigators were alerted to Scott's deception after discovering photographs of him completing a 10k race in July 2023, prompting the DWP to place him under surveillance from March 2024.

The footage that followed proved damning. Scott was filmed on a building site bending down to plaster a wall with a trowel, apparently without any difficulty whatsoever.

Further clips captured him ascending a scaffolding ladder, hauling heavy equipment across the site and sweeping up with a broom.

The evidence stood in sharp contrast to his claims of near-total physical incapacity.

Illegitimate payments totalling £7,625.68 flowed into his Monzo bank account between May 31 2023 and April 7 2024.

When confronted about the 10k race, Scott maintained to fraud investigators that he had found the run extremely difficult, claiming it took him a considerable time to finish and left him confined to bed for a fortnight.

Addressing the court, he said: "I would like to apologise for any trouble I have caused to anyone."

He attributed his actions to heavy medication use and a descent into severe depression.

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He told the magistrates: "I was going back to work but was not completely able to do it. I was getting picked up by a friend and taken in. It was more to try and pull me out of a deep hole."

Scott described his offending as "unintentional," insisting he had not been thinking clearly at the time.

The magistrates accepted that Scott's benefits claim had been genuine when first submitted in the aftermath of his workplace accident.

His offending stemmed from a failure to notify the DWP once his condition improved, rather than a fraudulent application from the outset.

The court also noted that Scott had no relevant prior convictions.

He was handed a community order alongside financial penalties amounting to £360, comprising a fine, prosecution costs and a victim surcharge.

The fraudulent payments, which ran for nearly eleven months, ultimately cost taxpayers more than £7,600 in public funds.

A DWP spokesman said: "Benefit fraud is not a victimless crime - it steals money from the people who need it most.

"Whatever your reasons for cheating the system, know that our investigators are wise to every trick in the book and we will find you.

"So, if you know someone is playing the system, turn them in."

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