A 41-year-old man has been given a 12-month conditional discharge for a £2,331 benefit fraud.
Stephen Joseph Keig didn’t tell social security he was working at Domino’s Pizza.
However, Keig is already serving a two-year sentence at the prison, imposed in May, for submitting fake orders for Covid tests during the pandemic.
The benefit fraud was committed between June 2022 and August 2022.
Keig, who last lived at Prince’s Avenue in Douglas, initially claimed income support legitimately, as he was signed off work.
But he then started working for Domino’s Pizza which he failed to declare.
This resulted in him being overpaid £2,331.55 to whcih he wasn’t entitled.
Defence advocate James Peterson asked for credit to be given for his client’s guilty plea and reiterated that his benefit claim had not been fraudulent from the outset.
‘His understanding was that he could undertake some hours, as long as those hours didn’t go above a certain level,’ said the advocate.
‘However, he accepts his hours did eventually exceed that.
‘It was over a relatively short period of time and not the highest overpayment.’
Mr Peterson said that Keig had instructed him not to seek a probation report and ask to be sentenced immediately, as the sentencing options were limited, bearing in mind the defendant was already in prison.
Magistrates also ordered Keig to pay back the £2,331.55 at a rate of £10 per week, starting within one month of his release from prison.