For 16 years, a woman managed to receive a permanent disability pension for pretending to be mute after being attacked by a client. The attack, which occurred in the supermarket where he worked, was the trigger for post-traumatic stress disorder for which Social Security granted him said benefit.
After the attack, the woman, from Cádiz, was left speechless. A consequence that, according to the medical court that evaluated it, wasand the result of a psychotic condition. A conclusion that led the National Social Security Institute (INSS) to grant him absolute permanent disability (IPA), with his consequent pension.
This event occurred in 2003 and he remained receiving the pension for years, until a private detective, hired by the company’s mutual insurance companydecided to follow her to verify that, indeed, the woman was still unable to speak due to the trauma. A decision that arose due to the lack of evidence requested by Social Security to reevaluate his case.
The question that revealed everything
However, this was not the only source of his suspicions. Already in 2019, the doctors at the mutual insurance company observed that he made no attempt to communicate. Furthermore, since 2009, His medical records did not show any speech difficulties.although he frequently went to different specialists. That’s when the detective began monitoring her.
His surprise was greater when he observed her accompanying her daughter to school and talking with the other mothers, as Manuel Espinosa Ortiz, CEO and main lawyer at EOM Equipo Jurídico, explains. To confirm his suspicions, the detective decided to approach the worker and ask her a simple question: “Hey, where is El Corte Inglés?” And she, instead of showing that she couldn’t speak, he responded completely naturally.
Having observed her behavior and with no apparent signs of the alleged speech disability, the company’s mutual insurance company filed a complaint against the worker. This, despite having been caught ‘red-handed’, alleged that the evidence collected by the detective should not be considered in a trial, since They represented a “clear violation of his constitutional rights”.
The ruling of the Superior Court of Justice
Despite this, the Superior Court of Justice considered that the information collected by the mutual insurance company was valid and that the report presented did not represent a violation of their right to defense, privacy or honor. A report that was prepared by the INSS Disability Assessment Team (EVI) and which declared that there were no indications of “any impairment of the organic limitations and/or functional” of the worker.
Taking into account what was observed by the EVI and the evidence presented by the detective, the court declared that it had been proven that “it was a simulation of the pseudomutism condition or, at least, a very favorable evolution of such a condition, since the inhibited symptoms have disappeared“.
The final ruling issued by the TSJ of Andalusia was clear. According to the lawyer, they finished “eliminating that pension and forcing him to return all the money and pay the costs of the trial.” However, according to Daniel Fontanals, a detective, in the program “Espejo Público” this type of behavior is usually quite common: “It is an environment in which we move a lot and every week. People who cannot walk and we find them doing sports, playing soccer…”.
Due to the frequency of this type of cases and added to the enormous public expenditure represented by the increase in cases of absenteeism in Spainthe Government has decided to reinforce the surveillance of those employees who are on leave due to temporary disability for two or more times in the same year.