Man jailed over plot to abandon American pensioner with dementia in UK

Simon Hayes arriving at Worcester Crown Court charged with perverting the course of justice
PA
Megan White30 April 2019
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A man has been jailed for his part in a plot to dump a dementia-suffering American pensioner in rural England.

“Fantasist” Simon Hayes abandoned Roger Curry with medical staff after claiming he had found him “face down” in a country lane near Hereford Hospital on November 7 2015.

Prosecutors claimed Hayes, 53, told "a pack of lies" about the 78-year-old, who had allegedly been dumped in the UK to receive care.

He was contacted by his “best mate” Kevin Curry, the victim’s son, before Mr Curry flew from California to the UK with his mother and father.

Simon Hayes was labelled a "pathological liar" in court
PA

At 4.20pm on November 5 2015, Hayes, dressed in a fake military uniform and putting on a US accent, took Mr Curry to Hereford bus station, near the hospital, telling a nurse and later paramedics that he had found the older man in a country lane.

Hayes left Mr Curry with medics after claiming he could not give any contact details because he was "working with the SAS" at their nearby camp.

Mr Davis said Hayes then joined Kevin Curry and his mother on a holiday to France and Copenhagen in Denmark.

Described in court as a "pathological liar", Hayes' actions and false witness statements led detectives on a "wild goose chase" trying to work out where Mr Curry had come from, and how he had got to the UK.

At Hayes' sentencing at Worcester Crown Court, Mr Davis said: "The defendant was part of a plan to bring Roger from the US and dump him in Hereford, abandoning him so he could receive care from local health care providers. It was clearly planned."

By March 2016, Roger Curry, who had an autistic spectrum disorder and Alzheimer's, had managed to tell nurses his name, before Hayes eventually handed himself in.

Jailing Hayes for two and a half years, Judge Daniel Pearce-Higgins QC said: "There's no certainty that had he not done that, he'd ever have been found."

But Hayes again lied, claiming he and a "Canadian Army serviceman" had found Mr Curry, that he lived in Los Angeles, and that at the time he had been "attending a course at the SAS base".

The prosecutor added: "He said he had been in the SBS and been in Hereford for a short while - but was unable to answer a simple question any serviceman would know - 'what's your Army number?'."

Hayes admitted perverting the course of justice and a separate case of fraud, in relation to a false character reference, ahead of a sentencing hearing on Tuesday.

Mr Curry was safely returned to the US in 2016, while his son is under investigation in the US for elder abuse, fraud and kidnapping.

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