A PALL bearer carried coffins at Doncaster funerals - while claiming to have a bad back and fiddling thousands of pounds in benefits.
Former miner Victor Malcolm Frost tried to exaggerate a back injury and claimed he had carried a coffin at only one funeral.
But Department for Work and Pensions investigators had evidence he worked regularly and his undertaker boss had never hear
d him complain about his back.
The Stainforth pensioner was claiming four different kinds of benefit over a four year period, on top of his mining pension, but kept quiet about his hearse work.
In total he falsely claimed more than £21,000.
The judge at Doncaster Crown Court suspended a three months' prison term for two years, saying he could carry out 200 hours of unpaid community work instead if he was fit enough to do paid work.
Frost, aged 67, of Turnberry Mews, Stainforth, pleaded guilty to four offences of failing to notify the authorities about a change in his circumstances after he claimed Disability Living Allowance, Pension Credit, Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit between April 2004 and March 2008.
Rachel Harrison, prosecuting, said on all the applications he said he could not work due to illness but from June 2004 he was working driving funeral limousines and carrying coffins as a pall bearer, without ever mentioning any disability.
When an officer visited him at home he denied working and insisted he still had health problems, then admitted to working for just one day, and then conceded it was "now and again".
Frost later admitted he had lied and had carried coffins, adding: "I thought I would get away with it but you can't."
Andrew Petterson, defending, said his initial claim was not fraudulent to start with but he had exaggerated his symptoms and then gained employment on an ad hoc basis.
"It was small earnings, being paid £16 a funeral. Then he split up from his wife and that caused him great distress and he failed to notify the authorities of a change in circumstances. These offences were not borne out of greed but financial hardship."
Frost is paying the overclaim back at the rate of £12 a week.
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