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Governmental administrative errors are always a possibility and one such mistake by Spain's social security system has allowed a man to collect the retirement pension of his father for 15 years after his mother's death. She was entitled to receive a widow's pension after her husband's death. The court, while acknowledging the negligence of the social security system, has found the son guilty of not reporting the mistake and deliberately collecting the funds through his parents' joint account, of which he had become co-owner.
As a result, the Supreme Court has sentenced the defendant to two years in prison, plus a fine of 400,000 euros and the payment of more than 230,000 euros as civil liability.
According to the court case, the father started receiving his pension on 17 February 1998. The benefit was paid in 14 annual payments. At least from 3 March 1999, it was being transferred to a bank account of the Caja General de Ahorros de Canarias (Caja Canarias), which he shared with his wife.
After the death of her husband, the mother went to the Social Security to apply for widow's benefits, providing the corresponding death certificate. Her entitlement was recognised and so she started receiving the sum through the same account. However, the social security staff did not stop paying the retirement pension, which meant that she was receiving two parallel types of benefit.
After his mother's death, the son became the holder of his parents' joint bank account with Caixabank (the entity into which Caja Canarias was integrated). Despite being aware of the payments, he did not inform either the social security system or the bank that the right to the benefit had been terminated or that his parents had died.
In addition, the bank did not fulfill its obligation to monitor the father's status and the funds were entering as per usual. The son continued using the funds for his personal purchases, from food and clothes to entertainment and bills, until the retirement pension payments ended on 6 July 2015. That was when the bank improved its control systems and informed social security officials of the death of the father.
At that time, the total amount unduly paid amounted to 317,465.19 euros. Of this amount, the bank returned 79,682.36 euros to the social security system for payments made in the four years prior to the notification of the death.
The accused was sentenced by the provincial court of Santa Cruz de Tenerife to two years in prison, plus a fine of 400,000 euros and the return of the total outstanding sum after Caixabank's payment. The defendant appealed, claiming that his mother had notified the institution of the death. This was recognised by the High Court of Justice of the Canary Islands, which overturned the conviction and acquitted him of the offence, considering that he had not committed fraud, having only benefited from an administrative error that was not corrected by the social security authorities.
However, the social security system did not accept this ruling and lodged an appeal with the Supreme Court. The new ruling recognised the negligence of the social security, which failed to cancel the pension after being informed of the retired man's death by his widow. However, the judge also considered that the defendant's silence aggravated the problem. Moreover, the son had knowingly benefited from the funds for years. The initial conviction was, therefore, upheld.
One of the judges issued a dissenting opinion in which he argued that the administration could and should have corrected the error. In his opinion, the defendant's conduct is reprehensible, but it does not constitute active concealment, but rather prolonged silence. For this reason, he proposed a more lenient sanction, considering that the breach of the duty to report the death should not carry the same gravity as premeditated fraud.
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