A WOMAN who accumulated a £30,000 benefits fraud over a ten-year period has been given a 12 month prison sentence, suspended for two years.

A court heard that Lubna Akhtar had been pursued by creditors after her husband ran up debts and abandoned her.

The 33-year-old woman, of Cherry Street, Blackburn, had been committed by magistrates for sentence at Preston Crown Court for one offence of false accounting, three of obtaining money by deception, with 264 further offences taken into consideration.

Initially her claim had been a legitimate one, but she still obtained benefits after getting a job as a care assistant. The case involved claims for income support, housing benefit and council tax relief.

The court had also been told that she had been put under considerable pressure to meet her husband's debts and that this had amounted to threats and harassment.

She has repaid around £700 of the money and will continue to pay off the outstanding sum.