Dog receipt from a dead man

Seven people from Nelson are facing charges over insurance fraud including one who put a receipt for a "£1,250 missing American bulldog" named Max to Direct Line from a man who had died earlier, the Burnley Express reports.

Majid Mahmood (27), claimed the bog he said had bought it from a breeder named Mr Green in Chapel Street, Nelson had disappeared from his back garden.

Two years earlier, police had been called to the sudden death of a man named Green at the property. The landlord of the house at the time was a son of Munsif Dad (60), one of Mahmood's alleged accomplices in the fraud, Burnley Crown Court was told.

Other claims

The hearing was told how Mahmood went on to claim on a Saga policy, stating a car had hit a wall – at the same house in Chapel Street. A £1,000 payout was also made to the defendant from Alliance Insurance PLC for a bulldog named Zak, said to have vanished just months before Max.

The court had been told how during the alleged fraud, between 2003 and 2007, fake claims were made for car crashes, building and roofing work – using forged invoices – as well as for several dogs.

The defendants are Munsif Dad, his sons Nadeem (28) and Amer Dad (25), all of Barkerhouse Road, Fiza Tariq (21), of Manchester Road, Shazeen Khan (27), of York Street, Mahmood, of Kensington Street and Ricardas Oleskevicius (30), of Fletcher Street, all Nelson. They deny conspiracy to defraud between March 2003 and December 2007 and money laundering.