Two professional British divers have been found guilty of fraud by claiming £250,000 from the National Health Service (NHS) for treatment of bogus cases of the bends. David Welsh, 49, from Plymstock, Devon, and 43-year-old Michael Brass from Liverpool, at Welsh’s Fort Bovis diving centre in Plymouth, paid strangers to pose as divers needing decompression treatment and billed the NHS £6,500 each for 37 fake victims…

Mr Michael Fitton, QC, prosecuting, said that the health authorities had not carried out thorough checks on the validity of the claims other than checking the “patients” details and that they were currently registered with a GP. “They did not challenge it very much and it therefore turned out to be quite a simple fraud to conduct,” he told the jury. “It was very easy money from just filling in forms and making up information using personal details and the money came in.”

The Fort Hyperbaric diving centre at Fort Bovisand has it’s own decompression chamber, also used for genuine cases of the bends, but a number of those supposedly treated had never dived or even been to Plymouth the court heard. Two other men linked to the diving company were cleared by the jury. Judge Ian Leeming, QC, said both men face probable jail terms.

Source: BBC

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