Jury told dentist netted £1.4m in con

A dentist from the West Midlands conned the NHS out of £1.4 million by making thousands of false claims for treating patients, including dozens of people who were actually dead, a jury heard.

Dr Joyce Trail, who is standing trial alongside her sister and daughter from the Black Country, is alleged to have used the proceeds of the con to fund a globe-trotting and free-spending lifestyle.

Dr Trail, aged 50, of Park Drive, Little Aston, Sutton Coldfield, her daughter Nyri Sterling, 33, of Ashwood Close, Oldbury, and sister Fiona Trail, 46, of of Belle Vale, Halesowen, all deny conspiring to defraud the NHS between April 2006 and March 2009.

Opening the case at the start of what is expected to be a five-week trial, prosecutor Miranda Moore QC alleged the fraud at Dr Trail's practice in Handsworth, Birmingham, involved more than 7,000 claims backed up by false paperwork.

Miss Moore told Birmingham Crown Court: "Dr Trail claimed and was paid a great deal for treatment she had not performed – not just a few claims, not just a few clerical errors but something in the order of £1.4m of false claims.

"The others (Fiona Trail and Sterling) both worked in the administration side of the practice and they assisted her in running this substantial fraud. We say you will be convinced that her sister and daughter played a part in this fraud, for which they were rewarded."

False lab dockets and invoices relating to dentures allegedly being supplied to residents in care homes are said to have been used to perpetrate the fraud.

Alleging that 100 claims were made for treating people who were in fact dead, Miss Moore added: "Dr Trail treated people who lived in nursing homes and residential care a great deal of the time.

"She double- and triple-claimed for people that she had actually treated and then she used patient details which had been quite unwittingly supplied to her by nursing homes to claim for people that she had never even met. It meant that the practice received in the order of £1.4m that it should not have done.

"But moreover, Dr Trail then siphoned off money which enabled her to live a lavish lifestyle. She was globe-trotting, spending time at very exotic locations."

The defendants face one count of conspiracy to defraud. Dr Trail and her sister also deny conspiring to pervert the course of justice in April 2009 as NHS investigators gathered evidence.

The trial was adjourned until Monday.