A woman who gambled over €200,000 while getting by on social benefits and failing to declare her earnings as a fortune teller, has had her suspended sentence and fine converted to effective imprisonment on appeal. Criminal investigations against the woman, whose name was banned from publication by the court, kicked off after police received confidential information in 2020 about her gambling sprees at local casinos. The woman appeared to be spending substantial sums of money, far beyond the income she declared for tax purposes. She was last registered as an employee in 2008, but was fired from that job after allegedly stealing cheques at the workplace. That allegation led to separate criminal proceedings. In 2009, the woman registered as ‘sole trader’ with the VAT department and set up a business as a fortune teller. Meanwhile, she lived in government housing and applied for social benefits. She received a total of €35,123.30 in 2008, 2009, 2012 and from 2014 to 2021, when she declared that she had no job because of her medical condition. She was also a mother of children who were still minors, the woman claimed. However, police investigations showed that she had gambled some...
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