Kamara/Carlson Saints and Scroungers


Kamara/Carlson

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This programme tracks down thieves. It exposes fraudsters and it brings help to those who really deserve it.

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This is the front line in the battle against benefit fraud.

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This is Saints And Scroungers.

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Saints And Scroungers

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is about busting benefit thieves who steal millions every year,

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and crack teams of investigators determined to scupper their scams.

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And we also shine a light on those who genuinely need the money

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and the people who help them get it. They are our saints.

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The saints get help and the fraudsters get their comeuppance.

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On today's programme...

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this cheating couple illegally claimed benefits,

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then used taxpayer's cash to set up a business.

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We found a goat farm, a fish farm.

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There was also a house and there was a farm shop.

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And we meet the parents of baby William,

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whose severe disabilities have left him facing an uncertain future.

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We don't know what time we have,

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could be a few months, or a few more years,

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but we want to make the most of it,

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so the idea of him in childcare without us, isn't an option.

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Could a charity help solve their money worries,

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while they devote themselves to caring for their son?

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Sometimes, crimes can go undetected for years

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and the perpetrators almost get away with it.

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But then, something happens that blows their cover

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and all their dirty deeds go up in smoke.

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Made Hassan Kamara from Belgium and Leila Raymond from Holland.

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They came to London to start a new life together

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and were expecting their first child.

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As European Union citizens they were entitled to benefits,

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and they put in a claim for housing benefit

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and council tax benefit, to help make ends meet. Sounds fair enough,

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but it seems this couple might not be as innocent as they appear.

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In fact, Croydon Council believe they conned

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the British taxpayer out of £82,000.

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Investigator Gail Campbell was in charge of the case.

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They came to the Council in 2001

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and claimed housing and Council Tax benefit from that date.

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Leila Raymond had no income

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and Hassan Kamara declared that he was a taxi driver

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working locally for a taxi company.

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Their daughter was born

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roughly six months after the initial claim was made.

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So a young couple at the start of a new life together in the UK.

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A little baby girl and a flat in a nice little area,

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plus a boost from the government to help them along their way.

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Things are looking quite rosy for Hassan and Leila.

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And life continued to go well for the couple.

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They lived in their flat claiming housing benefit

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and Council Tax benefit for the next nine years.

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But then, out of the blue, disaster struck,

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and their private lives suddenly came under scrutiny.

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I've come to Croydon to get the low-down on what

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would turn out to be a shocking story.

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Gail, to be honest, they look a lovely couple. What went wrong?

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Around a year ago, the building behind us caught fire,

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and everybody had to move out. The people that were in the top flat

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declared themselves homeless

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and needed to be put into some temporary accommodation.

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So, up to that point everything was OK, all hunky-dory.

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Yeah, it seemed to be fine.

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When interviewed, they gave their names

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as Hadiza Mohammed, the female,

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and Nura Kamara was her partner.

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They had told the housing officer

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that they'd never claimed any benefit before.

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What did you discover?

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The officer that did the interview made some background checks.

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On the database, yeah?

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The information held showed there was housing benefit,

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it was still being paid the day she checked, no cancellation to it,

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and the people who were claiming the benefit

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were a female called Leila Raymond

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and her partner Hassan Kamara.

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So all of a sudden, you've four completely different names?

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We've got four names, all supposedly living at the same address.

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What we also noticed was that the family,

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being interviewed as homeless,

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had a child and the people who were living at the address

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and claiming the benefit also had a child,

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and the child was exactly the same name and date of birth.

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What are you starting to suspect at this point?

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We're starting to suspect

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that Leila Raymond and Hassan Kamara

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are the same people as Hadiza Mohammed and Nura Kamara.

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So you think there's just one couple here?

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Yes. There's just one couple using a false identity

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to claim benefits.

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So Gail smelt a rat, and if this was fraud,

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it had been going on for nearly a decade.

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I ran checks on the address in Croydon,

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and found there was a claim that was live

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in the name of Hassan Kamara and Leila Raymond.

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Finding there was no national insurance for Leila Raymond

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was very suspicious because everybody needs a national insurance number.

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Gill discovered that in 2004, a housing officer

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went to the couple's flat to check details of their benefits.

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Hassan Kamara was at the property and he opened the door,

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and for identification purposes he showed his driving licence.

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He also told the visiting officer that Leila Raymond had moved

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and he had moved Hadiza Mohammed into the property.

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This is all starting to get a little bit confusing.

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Hassan Kamara is living here with Leila Raymond,

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but then she moves out and Hadiza Mohammed moves in,

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but then Hadiza Mohammed, it seems, is living with Nura Kamara.

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I mean, who's fake and who's real, here?

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Is anyone who they say they are?

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Suspecting false identities are being used to dupe the Council

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out of thousands in benefits,

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Gail asked the UK Border Agency for help.

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Part of the Home Office, it controls immigration

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and holds information on everyone who enters the UK.

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Tina Lyonette is one of their fraud investigators.

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We look at all aspects of criminal activity,

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that's either within the country,

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or people coming into the country using false documents,

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types of fraud they might be doing while they're here,

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using false documents, false passports,

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birth certificates, anything like that,

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in order to work and live and remain in the UK.

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Tina ran checks on the names of the two couples

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supposedly living at the Croydon flat.

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I checked all four names, there was no trace

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of Leila Raymond or Hassan Kamara,

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but because they're Europeans, supposed to be,

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there wouldn't necessarily be any trace,

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but I did find Hadiza Mohammed and Nura Ismael Kamara.

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Tina discovered that Nura Kamara and Hadiza Mohammed

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were both Nigerian. They were real people, all right,

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but, unlike the so called European couple living at the same flat,

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they were not entitled to claim benefit in the UK,

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or stay in the country without a visa.

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I requested the file for Nura Kamara and found

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that he'd married a French national in 2003,

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a lady by the name of Helene Vingadio.

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So, while Nura is living with Hadiza Mohammed and their baby daughter,

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he married a French woman, Helene Vingadio

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and then as the husband of an EU national,

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he applied for a Residents Permit to remain in the UK.

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What we needed to find out was whether

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Helene Vingadio was actually in the UK, whether she'd been working

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and whether in fact she was living with Mr Kamara.

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So, Hassan and Leila,

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the sweet couple with the little baby, may not actually exist.

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The net is closing in on benefit cheats Nura and Hadiza and

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on top of that, it turns out that Nura has also got a French wife.

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This plot is really starting to thicken.

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As the evidence against them mounts up,

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it looks like this dodgy duo are about to come unstuck.

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Nura Kamara would have us believe he's living with his girlfriend,

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his wife and their kid, all under the same roof.

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Yeah, a big happy family.

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Next, it's farewell to the scroungers and hello to the saints.

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The innocent men and women all over the UK in dire need of Government

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help and the people who show them the way to claim what they deserve.

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Getting ready for the birth of your first child has got to be

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one of the happiest times of your life.

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What happens if you find out your baby is going

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to be seriously disabled?

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How can you prepare for a new arrival that is going to

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turn your world upside-down?

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We were told that the baby would have very severe development delay and

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would have very severe epilepsy that would be very difficult to control.

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Basically, his brain just hadn't developed properly

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from about 14 weeks.

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At the time of all these things being mentioned,

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we hadn't a clue what they meant.

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With a lot of research on the internet,

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we were able to look up different things.

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We were told and read lots of things that he probably wouldn't

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have much of a lifespan, maybe last one or two years.

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Just from the things we'd read, but no-one really could tell us a definitive answer.

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When Baby William was born with severe disabilities

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that meant he may not live beyond 2,

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his parents Helen and Steve knew that they were going to need help.

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But they had no idea where to turn.

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It was massive change to their lives.

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William's main problems are that he has severe fits

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and he can't feed normally so he has everything fed through his tube.

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He was also a very floppy baby.

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At ten and a half months he still doesn't have any head control.

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We're not sure whether he'll ever develop that.

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Coping with the full-time level of care William was going to need,

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Helen knew that returning to work,

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even part-time as they had planned, just wasn't an option.

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There was no-one else that could physically care for William

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for all them hours. No-one else can feed him,

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they don't know how his pump works.

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No-one else would be able to spot his seizures like I can.

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But with their whole focus now on caring for William,

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Steve and Helen would also have to live on just one salary.

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Once we realised that Helen wouldn't be going back to work,

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obviously our income was going to be going down by quite a few

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thousand pounds so we had to work out what we were going to do

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with that and some of that came from tightening our belts.

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Not spending so much on holidays and things like that.

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Still, we needed to find other income from somewhere.

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But when a doctor put Helen in touch with Contact A Family,

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a charity that helps parents of disabled children,

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their local family support worker, Dawn, paid her a visit.

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-Hello.

-Hi. Come on in.

-Thank you.

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Helen first contacted me - I think William was probably

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a couple of months old and just had been told by her consultant that

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it was worth her giving us a call to see what was available to her.

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Before I spoke to Dawn, I knew a bit about disability benefits

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that were available but not a lot at all because I never really

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had any contact with that sort of thing before and often things like

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that are means-tested so I didn't know if we'd be entitled to anything.

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I didn't really know how much it would be or if we'd get any of it.

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Dawn explained that she thought William would qualify

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for disability living allowance.

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A lot of our families don't realise that DLA is available to them.

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They're often not aware they're entitled to it or the channels they should go down.

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Dawn guided Helen through the benefits paperwork step by step.

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It's a really long form, 50 pages,

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so there's a lot of information required. It's very daunting.

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She'd obviously filled in quite a lot before helping other families

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so she knew what level of information they needed and just helped me

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go through it all so I felt confident I'd given them the right information.

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Helen and Steve sent off a form and crossed their fingers

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but they didn't have to wait long.

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A few weeks later we got a letter back to say

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William was entitled to the higher rate level

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which we were really pleased about.

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It has meant an extra £73.60 a week for the family.

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That extra income from the DLA

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has lifted a bit of the weight off our shoulders.

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A lot of things that William needs particularly are sensory toys.

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Just the fact they are sensory toys, the price is increased,

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so being able to buy him things like that is great.

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Now that Helen's maternity pay is finished,

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Dawn has helped her apply for a carer's allowance.

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If she's successful,

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it will add an extra £50 a week to the family's budget.

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Looking to the future,

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they're planning what equipment William will need as he gets older.

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I'm working with Helen and Steve at the moment to look

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for grant provisions for William to have a pushchair

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that adapts to the chair that they're able to use in the house.

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We're obviously worried about having enough money to pay the bills

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and to buy the things William needed,

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but since we met Dawn and she's told us about different

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things we might be entitled to, it takes a lot of worry away.

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Because we know there are things in place to help us,

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just with the day-to-day things

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and we can just focus on enjoying spending time with William.

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I can't begin to imagine what it's been like for Steve and Helen

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with little baby William and just how hard that has been for them.

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Isn't it great to know there are people out there supporting them

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and money available to make life just that little bit easier?

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Now it's back to the world of the scroungers

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and were this couple suspected of fooling the system for years about to be found out?

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When their flat was destroyed in a fire, Nigerians Nura Kamara

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and Hadiza Mohammed came to Croydon Council for help, but investigators

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uncovered what they believed to be an £82,000 benefit fraud.

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The couple are suspected of creating fake European identities

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to falsely claim housing benefit and council tax benefit for nine years.

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But when they discovered that Nura Kamara had also married

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a French woman and applied for UK residence,

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the case began to look far bigger than first imagined.

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So, Gail, you found out from the Home Office that as well as living

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with Hadiza Mohammed, Nura Kamara was actually married

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to a French woman, is that right?

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That's right, yeah. The information held by the Home Office said that

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she came in in December 2002.

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And the marriage took place on 9th January, 2003.

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Bit of a whirlwind romance, wasn't it?

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One month later and they got married?

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Bit of love at first sight, I would say.

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Nura Kamara would have us believe he's living with his girlfriend,

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his wife and their kid, all under the same roof.

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Yeah, a big happy family.

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Either Nura's got a very understanding girlfriend

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or something very fishy's going on.

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Tina Lyonette, fraud investigator at the UK border agency,

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was on the case.

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One of the ways a Nigerian national might remain in the UK is

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if they marry a European national

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who is exercising their treaty rights.

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Treaty rights meaning they have to be living and working in the UK.

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She began to look into the history of Nura and Helene's case

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to see if it stacked up.

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In 2003, there was an application to the Home Office from both Helene

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and Nura to apply for residence permits on the basis

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of their marriage which had happened the month before.

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Helene was allegedly working for a shop in South Norwood

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so she appeared to be exercising her treaty rights

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and on that basis, the residence permits were issued.

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Because the initial application for the permit would only be

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issued for a year on the basis that Helene's contract of employment

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was short-term, they re-applied again a year later, both of them.

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This time Helene said that her contract of employment was permanent

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and they were now issued residence permits for five years,

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taking it up to 2009.

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Tina was suspicious that all was not what it seemed

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with Mr and Mrs Kamara.

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When I looked at Helene Vingadio, I found that there was

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absolutely nothing on record to show that she'd been living in the UK.

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There was nothing to show that she'd ever lived at the address.

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Where she'd allegedly been working, there was nothing.

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The shop had disappeared,

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there was no National Insurance contributions and

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she'd never even applied for a National Insurance number.

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Had she been working legally in the UK,

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there would have to be some record.

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The council's records raised more questions about

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whether this marriage was genuine.

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Shortly after he received leave to remain for five years,

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one of the Croydon Council visiting officers visited the property

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to update the housing and the council tax benefit records.

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The visiting officer found Hassan Kamara, another woman named

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Hadiza Mohammed and there was no mention of Helene Vingadio.

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So, where was Nura's French wife?

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It seemed she had vanished into thin air.

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At this point we were beginning to think she might be a real person

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because we'd seen a copy of her passport

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but she didn't live in the UK. In fact, had probably come in,

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got married and disappeared straight after.

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I also noticed that the signature on Helene's French passport

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didn't appear to match the signature on the Home Office application.

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That made me think that perhaps someone had completed it

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on her behalf.

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So not only is Kamara a suspected benefit fraudster,

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but he may also be guilty of immigration offences.

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It's time for the UK Border Agency to do some serious digging.

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Nura Kamara had leave to remain until 2009

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but he obviously wanted to make his stay permanent.

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He sought advice from solicitors and looked at

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the immigration rules in order to find ways in which he could remain.

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But things were getting tricky for Kamara.

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He had told the Home Office he was married to Helene

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but he now wanted to get permanent residency not only for himself,

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but for his long-term partner Hadiza and their daughter.

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It seemed to be that both had a plan when they first arrived

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in the UK that he would go down the route of marrying a European

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national in order to gain residence, and once he'd gained permanent

0:18:580:19:01

residence he could then apply for Hadiza to be his legal partner.

0:19:010:19:05

As long as he was married to Helene, he couldn't have applied

0:19:050:19:07

for residency for Hadiza, who was his real partner,

0:19:070:19:11

because he couldn't be in a subsisting relationship with both.

0:19:110:19:15

He came up with an idea that maybe he could say Hadiza

0:19:150:19:18

was his sister-in-law

0:19:180:19:19

and that the little girl was his niece rather than his daughter,

0:19:190:19:22

but in fact, that was his real partner and his daughter.

0:19:220:19:25

His solicitor advised him they would not be granted UK residency

0:19:250:19:30

but undeterred, this scrounger came up with another idea.

0:19:300:19:34

In 2009, he divorced his wife, Helene Vingadio.

0:19:340:19:37

He claimed that they'd been separated quite a long time

0:19:370:19:41

and that in 2006, he'd come home and found her in bed with another man.

0:19:410:19:44

That was the petition for his divorce, which was obviously granted.

0:19:440:19:48

Still pocketing housing benefit and council tax benefit under

0:19:480:19:52

the false identities of Hassan Kamara and Leila Raymond,

0:19:520:19:56

Nura Kamara was ready to put the final parts of his grand plan into action.

0:19:560:20:00

Nura's residency was due to expire in 2009

0:20:000:20:05

and just prior to that, he submitted a further application

0:20:050:20:09

for permanent residence so that he could stay here indefinitely.

0:20:090:20:14

He submitted a letter with that to say that he was now

0:20:140:20:18

divorced from Helene. She was living elsewhere,

0:20:180:20:20

but that he was now living with Hadiza Mohammed with whom

0:20:200:20:24

he had a child and he wanted her to stay on the basis of his

0:20:240:20:28

permanent residence so that she could get residence in the UK as well.

0:20:280:20:32

Nura Kamara has now divorced his French wife and is busy

0:20:320:20:36

formulating a plan whereby he and Hadiza can stay in the UK.

0:20:360:20:40

Surely he's got to be married to an EU national

0:20:400:20:43

in order to get indefinite leave to stay?

0:20:430:20:45

If you've been in a marriage with an EU national and then separate,

0:20:470:20:51

it doesn't mean you can't apply for permanent residence,

0:20:510:20:53

providing that the European national was working in the UK

0:20:530:20:58

for a continuing period of five years.

0:20:580:21:00

Although he was now divorced,

0:21:000:21:01

he had been in a relationship for the required amount of time

0:21:010:21:04

with Helene and he was granted permanent residence.

0:21:040:21:07

Nura had provided the Home Office with information that appeared

0:21:070:21:11

to show Helene living and working in the UK

0:21:110:21:13

and on that basis he had been granted permanent residency,

0:21:130:21:17

but now, Tina took a closer look at the file.

0:21:170:21:20

In 2008, Helene suddenly gets resurrected.

0:21:200:21:25

She applies to HM Revenue & Customs,

0:21:250:21:28

she submits wage slips saying that she's a self-employed hairdresser.

0:21:280:21:33

She still has no National Insurance number,

0:21:330:21:35

but on the basis of the declared earnings,

0:21:350:21:37

Inland Revenue then bill her for small amounts of tax.

0:21:370:21:41

What's odd about this is that

0:21:410:21:44

although she claims to have separated from Nura in 2007,

0:21:440:21:47

the invoices she submits are from the address in Croydon.

0:21:470:21:51

The UK Border Agency and Croydon Council were confident

0:21:510:21:54

they had enough evidence to bring this couple in for questioning.

0:21:540:21:58

In November 2010, they were invited for an interview

0:21:580:22:01

at the council offices and told

0:22:010:22:03

it was to discuss benefit options with them.

0:22:030:22:06

Over nine years, they had claimed over £70,000 in housing benefit

0:22:060:22:10

and over £11,000 in council tax benefit

0:22:100:22:13

using fake European identities.

0:22:130:22:16

When they arrived, they were shown into a room

0:22:160:22:18

and there was a team from the UKBA there.

0:22:180:22:20

They were then arrested for immigration offences

0:22:200:22:24

and taken to Croydon Police Station.

0:22:240:22:26

Social services came to look after their child.

0:22:260:22:29

A team of officers from Croydon Council and the UKBA went to

0:22:290:22:33

the bed and breakfast they were staying in

0:22:330:22:35

and searched their accommodation there.

0:22:350:22:37

We discovered that there was a lockup storage unit which

0:22:370:22:40

was in South Norwood, so we left and went and searched that as well.

0:22:400:22:43

What they discovered was a whole pile of evidence that

0:22:430:22:46

appeared to strengthen their case against the couple.

0:22:460:22:49

There were a large number of photographs found.

0:22:490:22:52

Particularly, nine or ten pictures of the wedding between Nura and Helene.

0:22:520:22:56

The pictures were both before and during the ceremony, and that was all.

0:22:560:23:01

That was all there was of Helene, but there were hundreds of photographs

0:23:010:23:04

of Hadiza and Nura together before the wedding,

0:23:040:23:07

day after the wedding, on a family outing,

0:23:070:23:10

and it just detailed their life.

0:23:100:23:12

The search also revealed a number of incriminating documents,

0:23:120:23:16

suggesting that Nura had been manufacturing a life

0:23:160:23:19

for his ex-wife Helene without her knowledge.

0:23:190:23:22

There were also the wage slips relating to Helene Vingadio

0:23:220:23:25

that mentioned her being self-employed as a hairdresser.

0:23:250:23:28

There's a number of handwritten wage slips there

0:23:280:23:31

and the correspondence from HMRC.

0:23:310:23:33

This leads me to believe that it's Hadiza

0:23:330:23:36

and Nura that are submitting these invoices to HMRC

0:23:360:23:38

so that they can deal with any incoming post

0:23:380:23:41

and any further enquiries.

0:23:410:23:43

The more evidence they uncovered, the more convinced they became

0:23:430:23:47

that Nura had created a fake life for Helene

0:23:470:23:49

that she knew nothing about.

0:23:490:23:52

We also found a notebook that contained

0:23:520:23:55

crib notes for Helene Vingadio.

0:23:550:23:58

There was her name, date of birth, the date she started self-employment

0:23:580:24:01

and also what appears to be a practice signature for Vingadio,

0:24:010:24:06

the same as it appears on the application forms in the Home Office.

0:24:060:24:10

There was also Helene Vingadio's original residence permit

0:24:100:24:13

that was issued from April 2003 to April 2004 bearing her photograph.

0:24:130:24:19

What's more, they discovered that Hadiza Mohammed had been

0:24:190:24:22

working illegally in a care home using a fake British passport.

0:24:220:24:26

In a lockup where all their furniture was stored after the fire,

0:24:260:24:29

we found a jewellery box which contained the false British passport

0:24:290:24:33

that she'd actually used in order to gain work.

0:24:330:24:36

There was now enough evidence to prosecute Nura Kamara

0:24:360:24:41

and Hadiza Mohammed.

0:24:410:24:43

Nura Kamara was charged with immigration offences which were...

0:24:430:24:47

Those are the benefit offences. Hadiza was charged with...

0:24:500:24:54

The couple both pleaded guilty.

0:24:580:25:01

In June 2011, Nura received a three-year prison sentence.

0:25:010:25:05

Hadiza was sentenced to 18 months in jail.

0:25:070:25:10

Both are appealing against removal from the UK when they're released.

0:25:100:25:13

He deserved the three-year sentence. Hadiza was very lucky

0:25:150:25:18

to get away with an 18-month sentence.

0:25:180:25:20

It was only the fact she's got children that stopped him

0:25:200:25:23

from giving her a longer sentence as well.

0:25:230:25:25

Nura Kamara had cheated the system to become a permanent UK resident

0:25:250:25:29

and at the time of their arrest,

0:25:290:25:31

his partner's application was being considered.

0:25:310:25:34

They had made up false identities to swindle

0:25:340:25:37

thousands out of British public funds.

0:25:370:25:40

Nura Kamara and Hadiza Mohammed were claiming benefits under the names of

0:25:400:25:45

Hassan Kamara and Leila Raymond right up to the day they were arrested.

0:25:450:25:50

One of the conditions of his leave to remain was that he had no recourse

0:25:500:25:54

to public funds, therefore he had to keep the two identities going

0:25:540:25:57

in order to claim the benefits.

0:25:570:26:00

It's systematic abuse of the British system of benefits and welfare.

0:26:000:26:04

It's taking advantage of people that actually need the money.

0:26:040:26:07

If it wasn't for the fire, they wouldn't have come to

0:26:070:26:10

the attention of the council or the Home Office.

0:26:100:26:13

They would have been given leave to remain in the UK

0:26:130:26:16

and possibly continued with the fraud for another good few years.

0:26:160:26:19

Nura and Hadiza scrounged money off the taxpayer for nine whole years,

0:26:190:26:25

and if that hasn't wound you up, cop a load of this.

0:26:250:26:28

We found details of property and land owned in Nigeria

0:26:280:26:34

and on this land, there was a goat farm, a fish farm.

0:26:340:26:38

There was also a house and there was a farm shop.

0:26:380:26:42

We think all of that was funded by the benefits we paid them.

0:26:420:26:46

That really gets my goat,

0:26:470:26:49

but I'm glad to say, it's game over for Nura and Hadiza.

0:26:490:26:53

Their master plan has finally been found out.

0:26:530:26:56

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