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A man suspected of committing a € 500,000 fraud by continuing to collect his parents’ old-age pension after their death has been released without charge.
Gardaí is going to prepare a file for the Director of the Public Ministry after the 57-year-old’s release.
The North Side Cork suspect was arrested at the GPO on Oliver Plunkett Street in downtown Cork shortly after 9 a.m. Friday and taken to Bridewell Garda Station for questioning about the fraud.
The man was detained under article 4 of the Criminal Justice Law, which allows Gardaí to detain suspects for up to 24 hours, but was released without charge on Friday night. Gardaí will now prepare a dossier on the matter for the DPP.
Officials from the Department of Labor Affairs and Social Protection became suspicious when the man was asked to provide proof that his father was alive to qualify for President Michael D Higgins’ Centennial’s Bounty.
The Centennial Reward involves the Centennial receiving a payment of 2,540 euros and a letter of congratulations signed by President Higgins on his 100th birthday after he has satisfied the department as to the veracity of his claim.
Gardaí believes that the man continued to collect his father’s pension each week at the GPO after the pensioner died in 1987, and similarly continued to collect his mother’s pension after she died a few years later.
Officials believe the man raised around € 520,000 in total in pension fraud, dating back some 33 years, believed to be one of the longest of its kind discovered in state history.
The man’s arrest follows a joint investigation by the Garda and the Department of Labor Affairs and Social Protection (DEASP), who notified gardaí of their suspicions about the man’s fraudulent allegations.
Gardaí and DEASP officials conducted a follow-up search of the man’s family home on the north side of Cork on Friday and seized some 9,800 euros in cash that they believe to be the product of their alleged fraud.
Det Insp Danny Coholan from Anglesea Street Garda Station said: “Gardaí and the Department of Labor Affairs and Social Protection have a long-standing relationship, which aims to attack those who try to defraud the state.”
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