Council prosecutes sub-tenant as well as tenant in unlawful subletting case

Westminster City Council has for the first time in a case of unlawful subletting successfully prosecuted the sub-tenant as well as the tenant for conspiracy to defraud.

Raymond Whittard and Sharon Smith pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud in June after Whittard sublet his Westminster apartment to Smith and her boyfriend while living at an address in Altrincham since at least 2010.

Whittard had claimed to be in a relationship with Smith to disguise the fact that the property was being sublet.

The defendants pleaded guilty to the following offences:

• Count 1: Whittard and Smith both pleaded guilty to a joint charge of conspiracy to defraud.
• Count 2: Whittard pleaded guilty to a Section 1 Fraud Act 2006 offence.
• Count 3: related to an offence by Smith under Fraud Act 2006 concerning her alleging to be Whittard's girlfriend. She had pleaded guilty to this offence at an earlier hearing on 07 April 2014.
• Count 4: Whittard pleaded guilty to a Section 1 Fraud Act 2006 offence in respect of his failure to notify Westminster about his purchase of property in Altrincham.
• Count 5: Whittard pleaded guilty to a further offence under the Fraud Act 2013.

This week Southwark Crown Court sentenced Smith to a 9 month suspended sentence plus 140 hours’ unpaid work. Whittard received 10 months suspended sentence plus 150 hours’ unpaid work.

A confiscation hearing is expected to take place later this year.

The initial investigation involved cooperation with the Met Police and Manchester Police. This resulted in joint raids on Whittard’s home address in Cheshire and the sub-let property, 10 Cuthbert House.

This established that Whittard was living in Cheshire and that Ms Smith and her partner were living at 10 Cuthbert House on the Hall Park Estate.

Cllr Daniel Astaire, Cabinet Member for Housing and Regeneration for Westminster City Council, said: "This landmark case just demonstrates the extraordinary lengths people will go to to commit fraud. Every property that is unlawfully sublet deprives a family of housing and makes the waiting list longer.

“Fraudsters of this nature put a tremendous strain on council resources at this time of reductions in council budgets and we are doing all we can to tackle this activity in Westminster."