A WOMAN who fraudulently claimed more than £30,000 in benefits has avoided prison.

Sharon Kersley, of Lucas Avenue in Clifton, York, admitted one count of fraud and three counts of dishonest representation for the receipt of benefits at York Crown Court yesterday.

The court heard the offences dated back as far as September 2006 when she was claiming benefits and living as a single woman, but in March of last year a search of her property found various documents, including motorbike insurance and loan applications under the name of her husband Glen Kersley.

Steven Thornton, prosecuting, said investigators also found social media updates and a receipt for an engagement ring, and Kersley was interviewed under caution in June last year.

Investigators had a statement from Kersley dated October 2009 which said she had no partner, but she later accepted she and her husband were in an "on-and-off" relationship but said he had not been living with her permanently until 2009.

The total amount of benefits Kersley had falsely claimed was £31,431.70, and the court heard Kersley had previous dishonesty crimes on her record, but had not been before the courts since 2007, and she was given credit for her early guilty plea.

Judge James Spencer said Kersley's record showed "she has perhaps been not so reliable on community orders", and he hoped that a prison sentence "will encourage her".

Sentencing, Judge Spencer told Kersley: "The amount involved here leaves me with no alternative but to impose a prison sentence, which will be suspended. You must be careful not to be dishonest in claiming of benefits and if it happens again you will go to prison."

Kersley was given a six month sentence, suspended for two years, a 12 month supervision order, and ordered to undertake a thinking skills programme.