A scheming grandmother who tried to sue a garage by claiming a car valet deliberately tripped with her a hose has been ordered to pay £70,000 herself after her claim was thrown out.
Dishonest Yvette Thomas, 54, tried to claim an incredible £130,000, plus up to £70,000 in further damages, against Southwick Car Centre but was told by a judge her story was not "in any way believable".
The mum-of-two hoped to get rich quick by alleging that a garage worker lifted a hosepipe as she was stepping over it, causing her to fall.
She told her lawyers she hurt her wrists, cut her knees, ripped her clothes and broke her watch and got her family to lie in statements corroborating her claims.
The former account manager at media company Archant said she was left needing a walking stick following the fall and was sacked from her job as a result.
She also said she could no longer go to the gym, had to quit salsa dancing and was forced to cancel a holiday to Gran Canaria.
She tried to claim £96,110 in lost earnings £200 in travel expenses to medical appointments.
Other claims included:
£950 on homeopathic remedies.
£70 for a broken watch which she said broke in the accident.
£150 for jeans, a shirt, cardigan and shoes she said were all damaged in the fall.
£3,600 in lost use of the company car when she lost her job.
£3,700 paying a gardener to trim bushes and prune her trees because she could no longer do it.
£11,268.18 in daily living care costs.
£2,000 in extra heating because she was housebound.
£70 in postage and telephone calls for correspondence with lawyers and medics.
£12,900 in loss of pension, life insurance and private healthcare from work.
Around £60,000 to £70,000 in general damages including pain and suffering, according to the insurance firm's lawyers.
But in reality Mrs Thomas, of Trowbridge, Wilts., invented an elaborate lie to try and con the business into paying her the hefty sum, the court concluded.
After a five-year legal battle, a judge threw the case out saying he didn't find her story "in any way believable" - and ordered her to fork out £70,000 costs.
It came after he was shown secret footage, filmed by the garage's insurers, which showed Mrs Thomas didn't use a walking stick except for medical check-ups.
District Judge Francis Goddard told Bath County Court: "In my judgment the case that Mrs Thomas puts forward simply does not add up.
"I do not find her story in any way believable notwithstanding that she may well have by now convinced herself that what she said happened did happen."
He added: "Something happened on that day that caused Mrs Thomas to come up with a version of events that, on a hearing of the evidence, is quite implausible.
"It was not a pre-thought out plan. The story put to the court germinated on that day and was elaborated upon over the months and years that followed."
Mrs Thomas, who lives in a £250,000 semi-detached house in a quiet cul-de-sac, was ordered to pay £70,000 legal costs, with £20,000 to be paid within 14 days.
The shamed divorcee had said that on May 31 2012 she took her daughter's Mini Cooper to Southwark Car Centre, five minutes from her home, for an MOT.
She later said that while she was there, valeter Edward Slow, 62, deliberately tripped her with an industrial braided steel hose attached to a pressure washer he was using.
The customer claimed she made "direct eye contact" with Mr Slow before stepping over the hose but he lifted it and she fell forward onto a concrete step.
Mrs Thomas, who is a grandmother, said: "The employee saw me fall but continued with what he was doing and did not come over and help me up. I did cry out when I landed."
Two months later, garage owners, brothers Andrew and Matthew Gregory, got a letter to say that Mrs Thomas was taking legal action against them.
Hospital records show that she did attend Trowbridge District Hospital's A&E that day where she had an X-ray, but the scans didn't show any injury from trauma, it was said.
The garage denied she ever fell and the accused employee insisted that the hosepipe simply brushed against her leg as she walked past.
Dad-of-seven Mr Slow, 62, of Warminster, Wilts., who has worked at the garage for 14 years, said: "I was rather angry when I heard what she was saying.
"I remember her coming in but it was just another day. She was walking around and she said the hosepipe rubbed against her leg and that it was an accident waiting to happen.
"Then suddenly it became this whole story that I had deliberately tripped her up - something I would never do.
"She just wanted to claim as much money as she could."
Despite this, the car centre's insurers initially offered Mrs Thomas a £10,000 settlement to avoid the hassle of the case going to court.
Mrs Thomas refused and instead compiled an elaborate list of costs she demanded the garage pay.
Rob Smart, Head of Commercial Claims at NIG insurers, said the firm had no hesitation in defending the garage against the "spurious, opportunistic" claim.
Solicitor Tim Marshall, of DWF Law, said: "Mrs Thomas was claiming that she was deliberately tripped over but she didn't fall over.
"She painted a picture of being a very disabled woman as a result of this. She said she couldn't leave the house without a walking stick, drink a cup of tea or clean her teeth.
"But a surveillance firm that was hired to follow her found that she was walking fine and there was no sign of any physical impairment - no walking stick, nothing.
"However, on the morning of her appointment with an orthopaedic surgeon she hobbled into the room with her stick.
"None of the evidence stacked up at all and the judge said he didn't believe a single word she said."
Southwick Car Centre boss, dad-of-one Matthew Gregory, 42, who has run the company for 20 years, added: "Mrs Thomas made this whole thing up completely.
"We are just glad that we have cleared our name and that the truth has come out."
Mrs Thomas declined to comment.
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