A 36-year-old serial fraudster has been sentenced to four years in jail with the final 12 months suspended at the Circuit Criminal Court in Tralee, Co Kerry, after she pleaded guilty to 18 counts of deception and theft.
Samantha Cookes claimed more than €60,000 from the Department of Social Protection in supplementary welfare and disability payments over four years, by fraudulently claiming she was terminally ill.
For over a decade, Cookes has travelled coast to coast in this country but most of the people who met her were introduced to her under a variety of different identities: Carrie Jade Williams, Jade O'Sullivan, Lucy Fitzwilliams, Jade Harris and Sadie Harris.
She is the subject of a four-year investigation by the Doc on One team at RTÉ which resulted in a six-part podcast which is now being turned into a television documentary.
Today, Samantha Cookes' past caught up with her at the Circuit Criminal Court in Tralee, where she was sentenced for deception and theft offences.
'Major discrimination'
The court was told she convinced a respected GP to fill out a form for her, saying she had already been diagnosed with Huntington's Disease: a genetic, nerodegenerative illness which is usually terminal.
She went on the attack when Department of Social Protection officials challenged her to provide supporting documentation, accusing them of "major discrimination".
The scam was uncovered when gardaí were called in, obtained her medical records which revealed that she had failed to turn up for scans and medical appointments ordered by her GP, and she had undergone no genetic testing for Hungtington's.
She was arrested outside the post office in Tralee on 12 July last year, where she had gone to collect two further disability allowance payments worth €232 each.
Cookes has been in custody since her arrest last July.
The court was told she has been engaging in education in prison, studying sociology, business, personal development and calligraphy.
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She also works two days a week in the prison laundry.
Imposing sentence, Judge Ronan Munro said Cookes had perpetrated her fraud by alleging she had Huntington's Disease, particularly knowing there would be natural sympathy forthcoming for it.
He said she had cynically exploited this sympathy.
Noting a number of previous convictions, he said Cookes was no stranger to deception.
Judge Munro described Cookes' offences as a significant fraud perpetrated over a protracted period of time.
He said it was also his understanding that she had taken money for trips to Lapland for children which never happened, and on another occasion she also posed as a psychologist.
'Abuse of the system'
Judge Munro referred to a number of aggravating factors in the case, particularly that public money was involved and that it was being diverted from people in genuine need.
"It is an abuse of the system and an interference with people who are in genuine need," Judge Munro said.
He said mitigating factors included Cookes' early guilty plea and the fact that she is serving a prison sentence for the first time.
He said he would not take into account Cookes' "self diagnosis" of psychosis, about which she had written to the court.
He said Cookes' plan was carefully orchestrated and was not without some sophistication.
The maximum sentence was five years in jail.
He said the reason why he was suspending the final year of the four-year sentence he was imposing was to afford Cookes an opportunity to seek treatment when she is released from prison.
In her letter to the court she had expressed a desire to pay back the money she owed.
After he finished imposing sentence, Judge Munro addressed Cookes directly, saying "I hope that this is the end of the offending".
