€15k claimed with false PPS number

A Laois resident who used a false PPS number to claim over €15,000 in unemployment benefits has received a two-year suspended sentence.

Axenia Alexei, aged 30, came to Ireland from Moldova in 2009 and used a false Latvian passport bought online to obtain a PPS number so she could work.

Garda David Smith accepted that Alexei had been working and paying taxes in Ireland until 2011. She began to use the false PPS number to claim jobseeker’s allowance when she lost her job.