A TERRITORIAL Army veteran who conned an insurance company out of £11,860 by claiming a fire that his wife deliberately started at their home was an accident walked free from court last Friday. Richard Bowden, 56, returned to his house, in Farnham, in February last year to find it ablaze and a neighbour trying to tackle the flames with a hose. He swore at his wife - who had been suffering from depression - when she admitted starting the fire, and she was later arrested. But Bowden - who has been in the Territorial Army for 30 years - made a claim to Churchill insurance company saying it was caused by an electrical fault in the tumble drier. The defendant, of, Sandy Hill Road, Upper Hale, was sentenced at Guildford Crown Court to nine months imprisonment suspended for two years, and 180 hours unpaid work, after pleading guilty to obtaining services by deception, and attempting to obtain property by deception. Patricia Lees, prosecuting, said that the day after the blaze - when Bowden's wife was still in police custody - officers visited him and explained she had admitted arson and been charged. But the defendant made the fraudulent insurance claim, and when a Churchill inspector came to the house the following day he repeated the lie. Ms Lees said: "Plainly at that point he knew what he was saying was not true. He made no mention that his wife had been in the building at the time of the fire or that she had been charged with arson." The Churchill inspector accepted Bowden's story and the insurance company paid him £11,860 to repair the damage. But after the insurers enquired into the cause of the fire they became suspicious and interviewed the defendant in May, asking him about his wife's arrest. Bowden altered his claim statement, but said that he did not find out his wife had been charged until two days after the fire, and he thought she had pleaded not guilty. He was arrested in November last year and a second payment of £930 was stopped. A further claim for £3,000 for the contents of the house was refused. Adrian Lovett, defending, said: "Shortly after making his claim after she (Bowden's wife) had been charged he may have worked out in his own mind whether she was guilty or not. "Whether she was responsible or not was a matter for the police to decide and not him. He accepts that." Judge Michael Addison told Bowden that he would spare him an immediate prison sentence, adding: "It was in effect an unprecedented offence committed when you were confronted with this situation." He said: "You claimed the fire was caused by an electrical fault which you knew was not true. It was a deliberate fraud and you obtained a substantial sum of money. "I accept it was a difficult situation for you with your wife suffering from depression. I do feel just able to suspend the operation of the sentence."
