A man has been arrested in Italy after it emerged that he had posed as a blind person for 20 years, during which He had received up to 150,000 euros in benefitss of the Italian social security. The man was finally arrested with his wife in Castellammare di Stabia, near Naples.
Both are accused of aggravated fraud to obtain public funds and falsification of documents public in relation to the disability pension and assistance allowance, according to the . As the Italian news agency Ansa has also noted, the man has partial vision, but has no difficulty finding his way, moving around or performing daily tasks, as he has been pretending for two decades.
An investigation by the financial police in the nearby town of Torre Annunziata ended up uncovering the fraud after they discovered last year that the man had received approximately 150,000 euros over twenty years for escort services, despite living without assistance. Given this, they proceeded to an initial seizure of assets worth approximately 125,000 euros.
The man lied in all the medical examinations carried out by social security experts and in 2010 he was declared permanently blind, a diagnosis that has not been questioned since then. Finally, security camera footage, a forensic expert and an ophthalmologist have now jointly concluded that his behavior was incompatible with that of a totally blind person.
The couple is now under house arrest while the process unfolds, which will continue at least until the end of November. Both are being prosecuted for aggravated fraud in relation to public aid, falsification of public documents and deception of doctors in the service of public structures.
