The care home owner tried to prop up his business with a £60,000 insurance fiddle after its roof suffered minor storm damage, a jury has been told.
David Simpson had the whole of the roof of the Bessmount House home in Kingskerswell replaced and claimed a further £47,000 for loss of business even though only one room had been affected.
He asked a roofer to change his quote so it looked as if the £8,500 cost was for repairing storm damage rather than a whole new roof, Exeter Crown Court was told.
Insurance company Aviva sent in investigators because they became suspicious about the size of the claim for loss of earnings and checked his claim that council health officials had ordered him to stop using four or five rooms.
Simpson ran the home for elderly people, many with dementia, until he sold it two years ago. He says the claims were honest and the figure for loss of earnings came from his accountant.
The insurance company paid out almost £16,000 before stopping further payments and calling in the police.
Simpson, aged 57, of Rattycombe Farm, Chudleigh, denies three counts of fraud. They allege he dishonestly claimed £8,550 for roofing, £4,400 for internal repairs and £47,052.52 for loss of earnings.
Mr Sean Brunton, prosecuting, said the building in Rose Hill, Kingskerswell suffered some storm damage to its roof in 2008 but could have been patched up at a fraction of the cost of what Simpson claimed.
He also claimed more than he was entitled to for the repairs inside the building and went on to tell the insurers that up to five rooms had been left empty for months on end.
He said:"When there was modest damage to the roof this defendant took the opportunity to try to raise a considerable amount of money to repair the home generally. It was greedy, dishonest, and we say fraudulent."
He said Simpson sent a falsified copy of a cheque stub to the insurance company to support his claim and lied to them about restrictions he claimed had been imposed by council health inspectors.
He asked Plymouth-based roofer Derek Marchant to change a quote to make it look as if it was for repairs when in reality it was to replace the entire roof.
He told his insurers that four rooms had to be vacated because of the damage but former staff told insurance investigators that only one was affected and that resident was moved to a spare one without any loss of business.
Simpson told police the claims were justified and that he had only passed on a figure for loss of earnings that came from his accountant.
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