A benefits cheat, who sailed the Atlantic in his yacht while receiving incapacity payments and illegally pocketing nearly £30,000 in housing and council tax handouts, has been jailed for four months.
Graham Axford, 58, who was exposed in a BBC Panorama programme called 'Britain on the Fiddle' secretly owned a property in Wales and part-owned a French farmhouse in Normandy, which he restored.
During the fraud Axford, of Belgrave Road, South Norwood, who has claimed incapacity benefit since 1995, sailed his £25,000 private 42-foot yacht from South Carolina to the Azores in the North Atlantic - a journey of 2,900 miles.
"On any view you have a joint interest in or owned part of a home in France by 2003 and in 2007 you declared to the council that you were not paying a mortgage and that was a blatant lie," Croydon Crown Court Judge Peter Gow QC told him.
"You were paying a mortgage on a property in Wales that you owned and later sold, although it was in negative equity.
"This was a fraud carried out over a significant period of time and you have been overpaid benefits as a result of your dishonest claims."
He tried to lie his way out of trouble during his trial, clashing with the prosecutor and swallowing medication in the witness box while claiming: "I'm trying not to get angry here, you are trying to twist this.
"I've had this from the council for two bloody years and I have just had to take a pill to stop my heart racing."
He was convicted of three charges of dishonestly making a false representation to the London Borough of Croydon on a housing benefit and council tax benefit application form by failing to declare property ownership in France and Wales, once in 2003 and twice in 2007, resulting in a loss of £29,456.55.
During the fiddle keen cyclist Axford, who stood as a Liberal Democrat candidate in the 2010 local elections, deliberately kept his ownership of a house in Commercial Road, Llanhilleth, Abertillery, Blaenau Gwent a secret along with his interest in the French farmhouse, which he regularly visited.
He bought the Welsh property for cash in 1984 and claimed in court he had transferred complete ownership to his ex-wife Suzanne in 1997 and the Land Registry were wrong in recording him as the owner.
"Have I told a deliberate lie? No, and I resent the accusation," said Axford before he broke down in the witness box.
No charges were brought regarding Axford's incapacity claim, which he made for a back injury following a motorcycle accident, but it did not stop him participating in a twenty-four hour time-trial championship two years ago as a member of Addiscombe Cycling Club.
Not expecting a custodial sentence he cycled in for his sentencing today and his bike remains locked to the court's railings.
Axford failed to comply with a confiscation questionnaire and Judge Gow told him: "Responsibility to comply with the court order is yours Mr. Axford and the court has the ultimate sanction of imprisonment if you fail to comply."
Mr. Len Furlong, defending, said: "He is a man with health problems, cardiac heart disease and a degenerative spine.
"He does work within the community, carries out duties in a soup kitchen, volunteers at a crisis centre, does cycle training for the disabled and on friday's works in a charity shop for the blind."
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