£1.3 million recovered from Jersey benefit thieves over the last decade

Jersey's authorities recovered nearly £1.3 million in fraudulent benefit claims over the last decade.

The newly-published figures only cover successful prosecutions, so the actual amount fraudulently claimed in that time is likely to be much higher.

Information is only available from 2012 when the data was moved onto an electronic system.

Since then, there have been 28 successful prosecutions for benefit fraud in Jersey.

The largest amount saw someone overclaim benefits by more than £162,000 and six cases deal with figures over £100,000.

From these 28 prosecutions, 11 prison sentences and 14 community service orders were handed down.

This comes weeks after a woman in Jersey was jailed for nine months after she was found to have fraudulently claimed almost £34,000 in benefits over four years.