The referral was revealed after world No43 Matthew Selt was taken to court by Susan Hickenbotham in a row over the family home
A snooker pro’s mum will be referred to the authorities for alleged housing benefits fraud after a bitter legal battle over a £620,000 family house.
Susan Hickenbotham claimed her son Matthew Selt, the world No43, his sisters Claire Noble and Charlotte Hamblin ganged up and demanded she sign the family home over to them, reducing her to tears. Hickenbotham, who has been claiming social security and housing benefits since 1992, claimed ownership of the house in Romford, where she has lived since 1998, and which is now worth around £620,000.
Hickenbotham was served an eviction notice by her daughter Claire Noble in 2024. She claimed she bought the property from her ex-husband Michael David Selt for £75,000, as a gesture of goodwill after they split up. The mum-of-three claimed she put £7,500 towards the mortgage in 2000 and bought the house outright in 2011 after she was left some money by her father.
She claimed this money was given to Noble to put towards the house, but Noble kept it for herself. Hickenbotham’s lawyer has claimed her children created a ‘sham tenancy’, listing Noble as the owner and her mother as the tenant so she could claim housing benefit. Selt, 41, said he didn’t remember the details of the property being acquired in 2000 or the deed signing in 2019.
Judge Simon Monty KC on Thursday warned the family the case could end in “mutually assured destruction.” In his judgement, he said Hickenbotham’s account of how she raised £7,500 to put towards the house was “unconvincing.”He said Hickenbotham did pay Claire £7,500 in cash to Ms Noble but it was to be used towards renovations rather than being a deposit.
The judge said: “None of Susan, Claire or Charlotte come out of this well and I did not think that any of them were convincing witnesses. I approach their evidence, all of it, with considerable caution.” The judge decided Hickenbotham was lying about being forced to sign a deed.
He said: “In my view, there was a meeting, which was probably on 6 June 2019, at the property, attended by Susan and the three children. There was no draft deed produced at the meeting, and there was no shouting by the children. Claire went through the proposed deed, and whilst she and her siblings were very keen that Susan should sign it, there was at that time no document to be signed and nothing was signed at that meeting.
“I do not accept Susan’s version of events- I accept what Claire, Matthew and Charlotte say about the meeting. None of the children recall Mark being there. He was not. I do not accept anything Susan says about the shouting or the tears or her being distressed and upset. I regret to have concluded that Susan has made all of this up.”
The judge dismissed Hickenbotham’s claim but said she did contribute £7,500 to the purchase. He also concluded that Hickenbotham had given Noble £96,000 which she had got to her father in order to pay off her mortgage but that Ms Noble did not put it into the mortgage. The judge said the tenancy document was a ‘sham’ by Noble and Hickenbotham to deceive the local authority.
He said: “Susan, with the assistance of Claire, has perpetrated what appears to have been a housing benefits fraud between 2000 and 2019 by setting up a false tenancy agreement naming as the tenant the true owner of the property knowingly in order to receive housing benefit which was used to pay the mortgage. I do not think Charlotte was involved. Matthew was not involved.
“Although Susan had a 10 per cent share in the property, the deed was freely entered into. By the deed, Susan declared that she had no interest in the property. The claim is dismissed. I intend to report Susan and Claire to the appropriate authorities in relation to the apparent benefits fraud. This is a very sorry, and I have to say, entirely predictable, end to these unhappy proceedings.”
Tom Russell, KC, representing his mum, earlier said the sportsman gave “no significant detail” during his evidence. He said: “I wonder if this is an effect of his profession, being in the public eye, which is to deny everything. It was like a no comment interview, he didn’t recognise any documentation, he did not recognise any facts of the case supported by documentation,” he said.
He said Selt could not remember details of his eldest son’s first birthday party, at which Mr Selt and his siblings say the deed was signed by their mother in 2019. Judge Monty had said Selt was not as involved in the case as his mother and sisters. He said: “He’s not really at the centre of all of this, he’s the most distant.”
Hamblin, who represented herself and her siblings, told the court: “The claimant has shown she can be violent to both the public and her family. Hamblin said there were “huge evidential gaps” in her mother’s case, and that she had been happy with the arrangement on the house for years before bringing the lawsuit.
She said for years there was “no mention of the deed, no mention of the tears, and no mention of the duress.” She added: “It is only when the claimant’s relationship with the first defendant [her eldest daughter Ms Noble] failed, and she was asked to leave because of her own evidenced conduct. The claimant agreed under oath her divorce was toxic. “What is more likely, that the father wanted his children to have the property, or he wanted to give it to his ex-wife?”
Hamblin said an email from her dad was shown to the court “confirming he did not want the property to go to his ex wife,” adding: “He is either not being truthful in court to benefit herself financially, or she has been lying to the benefits system for many years both are acts of dishonesty.”
Matthew made his first 147 of his 24-year career at the BetVictor Championship League in January. Last year he was removed from his position as vice-chairman of the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA) players’ association for ‘rude and aggressive’ behaviour at the 2024 Saudi Arabia Masters.
