
A man named Stoyan Stoyanov, who is 28 years old and from Bulgaria, was part of a group that carried out the biggest benefits fraud in British history.
This group stole around £50 million by making false claims for Universal Credit, a welfare system in the UK. They used fake documents and stole people’s identities to do this.
Stoyanov has already served a four-year prison sentence for his role in the scam, but he is still in the UK on immigration bail. This means he is allowed to stay in the country temporarily while his case is being dealt with.
Stoyanov is now saying that he is living very poorly, barely managing to survive day by day. He wants to go back to Bulgaria, but the UK authorities are not letting him leave yet. They are trying to recover millions of pounds that were stolen and hidden by the gang. Until they find this money, Stoyanov has to stay in the UK.
The gang that Stoyanov was part of set up three places in London where they made fake documents like rental agreements, payslips, and letters from landlords, employers, and doctors.
They used these documents to make false claims for benefits. The scam went on for years without being noticed because the checks for fraud at the Department for Work and Pensions were not good enough.
The scam was only discovered when a police officer in Bulgaria told UK authorities that people in his town were suddenly living very luxurious lives with money stolen from UK taxpayers.
The Department for Work and Pensions thinks that the amount of money stolen could be much more than the £50 million already found. It could be hundreds of millions of pounds.
At a recent court hearing, Stoyanov asked to be sent back to Bulgaria, saying that his wife and children, who all have health problems, are suffering. But the judge told him that he had committed a very serious crime and must face the consequences.
Stoyanov’s lawyers are unhappy with the delays in the case. They say that Stoyanov cannot work, cannot claim benefits, and has no future in the UK. The process to recover the stolen money is still going on, and Stoyanov might have to stay in the UK until the summer.
The leader of the gang, Galina Nikolova, who is 39 and Stoyanov’s long-term partner, is still in prison serving an eight-year sentence. Another member of the gang, Gyunesh Ali, who is 34, got a seven-year sentence.
He had been showing off his expensive lifestyle, which was paid for with stolen benefits. A woman named Tsvetka Todorova, who is 53 and stole nearly £300,000, has already been released from prison after serving half of her sentence. She even bragged in an interview that her time in prison was like staying in a vacation home, where she used the gym and got manicures.
So far, the authorities have only recovered £1 million of the stolen money. They are not letting Stoyanov leave the UK until they find more of the hidden assets linked to the fraud.