Beggar rakes in £23,000 in donations

Beggar rakes in £23,000 in donations

Written by Tom Flack   

A man masquerading as a beggar has been fined just £100 despite hauling in up to £23,000 in donations from the public.

Daniel Terry, 31, who has received 22 previous convictions, dressed up as a tramp despite living in a house and earning £80 a week in incapacity benefit.

Convicted

After ignoring police warnings to stop, Terry was charged with begging on August 11, and pleaded guilty yesterday in Lincoln Crown Court. Magistrates subsequently fined him £100 – a tenth of the maximum possible fine of £1,000. He was told to pay a further £40 in costs. 

The prosecution said that Terry had claimed he could make up to £50 on weekdays, and £100 on Saturdays and Sundays. This equates to annual earnings of £23,400, plus £4,000 in benefits – equivalent to a salary of almost £37,000 before tax. 

The average annual wage for full-time employees £25,800 – almost a third less.

Terry told the Court he had no permanent address, but instead staying with friends. Later he told the press: "I do get £80 a week but that is just not enough to get by on.

"The idea that I was earning £25,000 from begging and blowing it all on drink and drugs is a joke. I just needed the money to survive. 

"At least I never turned to shoplifting or burgling people's homes."

A slap on the wrist

Last night a spokeswoman for the TaxPayers' Alliance described Terry as a charlatan, adding: "It's a disgrace that he's only received a slap on the wrist for claiming benefits on top of his illegal income."

The news comes after figures from Department of Work and Pensions revealed that Benefit fraud costs UK taxpayers over £1bn per year. Estimates suggest the real figure could be as high as £3.5bn.

The Vagrancy Act, which dates back almost 200 years to 1824, forbids magistrates from imprisoning beggars.
Source Daily Finance