A woman posing as a widow from Grenfell Tower pretended her “dead” husband had been miraculously found in a cave as part of a £19,000 fraud.

Joyce Msokeri, 47, told authorities she had escaped the devastating west London fire in June last year and thought her husband had died – but she was actually single and living miles away at the time.

For weeks she stayed in a Hilton hotel and filled the room to bursting with donations and gifts from well-wishers. While there she concocted an elaborate ploy to claim insurance for the death of her fictitious partner.

But when her scam began to unravel, she pressed on with her fraudulent activities, exploiting a vulnerable man by persuading him to pretend to be her husband so she could tell investigators she had miraculously found him living in a cave in Margate, Kent.

Despite being twice arrested on ­suspicion of fraud, she continued with the pretence and managed to get him admitted to a mental health ward to support her claim.