His disability record showed he couldn’t walk more than 20 yards at a time without severe pain, but he completed a 6.2-mile run.
For that reason, Brian Rawsthorne of Manchester, England, is in trouble.
Rawsthorne received $19,000 in Disability Living Allowance during a 35-month period after he told the Department for Work and Pensions he suffered the pain as a result of burns and lung damage from a 1979 mine explosion, according to the Daily Mail.
Then, an investigator received an anonymous tip that Rawsthorne had officiated at soccer and cricket games and that he’d completed the 6.2-mile race. (Was the tipster someone who disliked one of his calls?)
Rawsthorne said in court that he walked most of the race and was in “absolute agony” afterward, unable to walk at all for five weeks.
Despite that testimony, he was found guilty of failing to notify authorities of a change in his circumstances. A fraud manager said the agency plans to seek repayment for the money from Rawsthorne.
