Man jailed for keeping dead mother’s body in freezer and pocketing her benefits
Christopher Phillips, who had been his mother Sylvia’s primary carer since 2008, given two years and four months in prison A man has been jailed for keeping his dead mother’s body in a freezer at their shared home for almost three years, during which time he received more than £70,000 of her benefits and other funds. Christopher Phillips, 60, stored the body of Sylvia Phillips, a retired company secretary, in the chest freezer in the living room of their house in the south Wales seaside town of Porthcawl. He regularly placed flowers on top of the freezer, which he bought two days after her death, and carried on talking to her about soap operas and horse racing. When police arrived to check on his mother, who was 89 when she died, he told them she was away in London, but they found her body after spotting flowers on the freezer. Phillips, a former company director, accessed his mother’s bank account, made withdrawals from her savings and pocketed benefits, Merthyr crown court heard.
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She told him: “You continued to collect her prescriptions and misled medical professionals about her whereabouts, lying when inquiries were made about your mother, repeatedly telling medical staff that she did not wish to attend appointments or undergo tests. “Your mother’s pension and benefits continued to be paid into her bank accounts, which you were able to access.” Ruth Smith, defending, said Phillips had been “exceptionally close” to his mother.
