The mother jailed for plotting to profit from the staged kidnap of her nine-year-old daughter is living life on £300 a week in benefits, it was claimed today.
Karen Matthews, 44, who made up the disappearance of Shannon in 2008, is said to be spending her time after prison enjoying takeaways, scratchcards and manicures.
The mother-of-seven from Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, now lives under a new identity in a town in the South of England after serving her eight-year sentence.
She is also said to be preparing for a New Year makeover after getting engaged to a paedophile with a charity shop ring, and wants to get her teeth redone on the NHS.
And Matthews is said to be making the most of the equivalent of about £300 a week in cash and housing for her free one-bedroom garden flat, reported The Sun.
Karen Matthews is pictured in a town in the south of England, where she lives under a new identity, enjoying a McDonald’s takeaway on September 3, 2018
Karen Matthews (left, pictured on January 2 in a town in the south of England) got engaged to handyman Paul Saunders (right), 57, who was jailed for five years in 2010 for child sex offences
Matthews, who also has free bus travel, is said to regularly visit manicure bars, her local McDonald’s branch and buy sweets and chocolate from discount stores.
She also allegedly smokes ten cigarettes a day, regularly buys scratchcards and eats chip butties from a local fish shop – but thinks the food served in the North is better.
A friend in her hometown told The Sun: ‘She gets everything paid for and her life is pretty sorted and stable.
‘She can’t work because of who she is so gets everything on a plate. She lives in a garden flat in a nice town, with a bus stop nearby.
‘She Facetimes family and friends all the time on a smartphone. Karen always has cash for a McDonald’s, fags and the lottery and she’s always getting her nails done.’
Matthews (left, in Dewsbury in 2008) is notorious for faking the kidnap of her nine-year-old daughter Shannon (right) when she and her ex-boyfriend’s uncle hid her in a bed for 24 days
Matthews was pictured looking elated with her ex-partner Craig Meehan after Shannon was found alive in Dewsbury in 2008. Meehan was not involved in the kidnapping plot, but was separately convicted of possessing 49 indecent images of children on a computer
Last week it was claimed she had become engaged to Paul Saunders, 57, who MailOnline revealed was a convicted paedophile.
Saunders was arrested at his lover’s home by Thames Valley Police after officers discovered he was living with his fiancée and had breached his bail conditions.
He was later released on bail, and is said to have made up with Matthews after they were said to have fallen out following the revelations about his past.
A source said: ‘Paul has been showering her with gifts since they met. But the ring was not expensive at all. Karen picked it after spotting it in a charity shop.’
Saunders was jailed for five years in 2010 for his abuse of a girl who said after his conviction at Oxford Crown Court: ‘He makes me sick. He should die. I hate him’.
Matthews in March 2008 holding her daughter’s favourite teddy bear as she feigned an appeal
Matthews (left) and co-conspirator Michael Donovan (right) were both sentenced to eight years in prison in January 2009 and released in 2012 after serving half their sentences
He abused his vulnerable teenage victim over a three-year period between 2006 and 2009 and was only caught after he was separately jailed for benefits fraud.
The sexual abuse was discovered when indecent images of the girl were found on his mobile phone by his then partner. She was aged between 15 and 17 at the time.
Meanwhile Matthews allegedly wants to lose weight after putting on two stone and fears her hair might fall out due to stress and dying it for years to hide her identity.
The source added: ‘She wants to get her teeth redone. She says she it is getting done on the NHS and it could cost taxpayers several thousand pounds.
‘Karen also put on weight in the lead up to Christmas. She became obsessed with Haribo. She wants to lose the pounds she has put on.
Shannon, who was found inside Donovan’s flat (left), was forced to adhere to a strict list of rules (right), which were signed off with ‘IPU’, which the jury was told stood for ‘I promise you’, a threat Matthews used against Shannon
‘She thinks she is a celebrity and everyone will want to see her on her big day. Karen is desperately seeking an agent. She has put feelers out already.
‘She thinks she is famous because the staff in her local corner shop call her ‘Celebrity Lady’. But it’s only because she is in the papers for the wrong reasons.’
Last year Matthew unsuccessfully tried to sell the rights to her autobiography to fund £12,000 of cosmetic surgery treatments including a nose job and an eye lift.
Matthews and her ex-boyfriend’s uncle Michael Donovan were jailed in 2008 for the plot to stage Sharon’s kidnapping and claim the £50,000 reward for ‘finding’ her.
She made a series of tearful TV appeals for help in finding her daughter as West Yorkshire Police launched one of the force’s largest ever searches.
Shannon was eventually found by detectives in Donovan’s flat, around a mile from her home in Dewsbury, 24 days after she disappeared.
Prosecutors said the girl was drugged and probably kept captive on a leash during her incarceration.
Police described Matthews as ‘pure evil’ after she was found guilty of kidnap, false imprisonment and perverting the course of justice.
Her then-boyfriend, Craig Meehan, was not involved in the kidnapping plot, but was separately convicted of possessing 49 indecent images of children on a computer.
She and Donovan were both sentenced to eight years in prison in January 2009 and released in 2012 after serving half their sentences.
Shannon was raised by a new family under a new identity and is now an adult. Matthews no longer has any contact with Shannon or her other children.