A mother lied to police following a car crash, provided a false alibi for her son, and offered money to someone to take the blame for a spree of burglaries.
Katy Grew also submitted a fraudulent claim to a car insurance company claiming to have suffered whiplash injuries for a collision she was never involved in.
Swansea Crown Court heard that in February 2018 Grew's son Daniel Bloomer and his close friend Allyn Freeman carried out a series of night-time creeper burglaries on the homes of elderly women in the Aberystwyth. Bloomer knew the victims were vulnerable because of his work as a carer. Grew and Bloomer then offered to pay Freeman if he would take sole responsibility for break-ins.
Bloomer and Freeman were sentenced to four years each for conspiracy to burgle when the case came to court in December 2020, and Bloomer was also given an additional six months for attempting to pervert the course of justice. Grew's involvement in this case could not be reported at the time because she was facing prosecution for other offences, which can now be fully reported.
Craig Jones, prosecuting, said on the evening of March 15, 2019, Daniel Bloomer was involved in a collision on a country road near Devil's Bridge, Aberystwyth, when he hit sheep which had escaped from a field. The crash injured a number of the sheep and left the car damaged. Bloomer spoke to the farmer who was trying to round up the animals and told him that the car belonged to his mother. It later emerged Bloomer was not insured to drive it.
The court heard that later that same evening 50-year-old Grew went to see the farmer and handed him a note containing insurance company details but which named another son of the defendant, 33-year-old Nathan, as the driver. The farmer, noticing the name was different from the one he had been given earlier, went online and found the Bloomer brothers on Facebook.
Mr Jones said: "The prosecution say this was the beginning of a clear attempt by the defendants to disguise the true identity of the driver because he was not insured at the time."
The court heard that the day after the crash Grew contacted her insurance company by phone and told them about a collision involving her son Nathan. A few days later she contacted the firm again to say she had actually been a passenger in the vehicle at the time and suffered injuries which she wanted to claim for. Grew went on to contact the insurance firm once again and change her story, this time claiming she had been the driver and had been "distraught" while making the earlier reports of the collision.
Mr Jones said police separately interviewed Nathan Bloomer and Grew with the defendants both handing in prepared written statements in which they said Nathan Bloomer had been driving the car on the day in question. Meanwhile the insurance company had appointed a claims investigator who spoke to the farmer involved and the investigator was told "quite clearly" that Daniel Bloomer had been the driver and not Nathan.
The prosecutor said while this "on-going deception" was being perpetrated Grew also gave police a false alibi in regard to Daniel Bloomer and his cousin Jordan Hales who were being investigated for carrying out an aggravated burglary in Lampeter. Grew told police that on the day of the burglary her son and nephew, who was staying with them, had slept in until lunchtime, and then they had all gone to see her mother in Aberystwyth. She said her son had then gone on to see his girlfriend in nearby Bow Street while her nephew had spent the night with her watching Netflix.
Mr Jones said Grew also contacted her son's girlfriend and asked her to back up that version of events, telling her: "You need to say Dan was with you all night" and suggesting the she tell the police Daniel Bloomer had spent the night at her house and the couple had enjoyed "banging sex" together. The prosecutor said the girlfriend told Grew she didn't want to go along with the plan but the defendant "continued to pester her with text messages and phone calls".
Check what crimes have been reported in your area:
Grew, of Devil's Bridge, Aberystwyth, Ceredigion, admitted fraud and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice in relation to the car crash, to perverting the course of justice in relation to the false "banging sex" alibi, and to a joint charge of perverting the course of justice in relation to trying to get Freeman to take the blame for the creeper burglaries. Nathan Bloomer, of Banc y Darren, Aberystwyth, admitted the conspiracy to pervert the course of justice charge. When Grew and Nathan Bloomer entered guilty pleas on what was the second day of their trial the case against Daniel Bloomer was discontinued.
Denise Fitzpatrick, for Grew, said the defendant had worked in the care sector from leaving school until 2018 when ill-health had forced her to quit. She said references spoke of client has a hard working and caring woman who put the needs of her children and grandchildren before her own. She said Grew felt "disgust" at what she had done and said she had acted "very stupidly" while truing to protect her son. The barrister added that Daniel Bloomer had not been charged with the Lampeter aggravated burglary.
Judge Paul Thomas QC told Grew her actions, while motivated by a sense of "misplaced loyalty" , struck at the very heart of the criminal justice system. He described the defendant's lies to the car insurance company as "brazen".
Grew was sentenced to a total of 12 months in prison and Bloomer to nine months. The defendants will serve up to half those periods in custody before being released on licence to serve the remainder in the community.
Dyfed-Powys Police does not release custody photographs for defendants sentenced to less than 12 months in prison
