A SINGLE mother from Winsford has been cleared of fiddling the DSS at Mold Crown Court.

The prosecution alleged that Joanne Louise Rimmer, aged 26, of Crook Lane, had falsely claimed more than £4,000 in benefits by failing to declare maintenance she was receiving from her former lover via the Child Support Agency.

Miss Rimmer denied five specimen charges of obtaining benefit from the DSS between May 1996 and February 1997 and was cleared by the jury.

Prosecuting barrister Mr Anthony Jamieson told the jury that Rimmer would not have been entitled to any benefits had she told the truth.

She had been claiming income support while receiving child maintenance in respect of her daughter.

An investigation, sparked off when a CSA officer noticed that she was also on benefits, showed she had been receiving £63 a week from the DSS and varying amounts of child maintenance.

Miss Rimmer agreed that she had received the cash but told the court she had not acted dishonestly.

She had to give up work to look after her daughter, the forms she filled in were correct at the time and when she started receiving maintenance payments she believed that they were arrears for an earlier period.

Maintenance payments were also sporadic and she was never informed when they were being made. They would simply appear in her bank account when she went to check the statement.

Miss Rimmer, who was suffering ill-health including depression, said that she believed she was entitled to the money, had certainly not acted dishonestly, and the money had been spent on essentials for her child.

Defending barrister John Sawyer said his client had not believed that she was doing anything illegal and had been desperate to care for her baby daughter.

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