$20,000 cancer scam court case drags on

The woman was due to be sentenced again today but a necessary probation report was not completed. Photo / File

The long-running court case of a woman who faked cancer to scam $20,000 continues to drag on.

The 24-year-old - who has name suppression - admitted fraudulently fundraising on donation website Givealittle but attempts to have her sentenced, including today, have been consistently thwarted.

The hearing was adjourned several times over the past year when the defendant failed to show up to court because of health complaints, with the judge even threatening a bedside hearing in hospital.

In September last year, police laid three charges of obtaining a pecuniary advantage, totalling more than $15,000, by deception and a fourth charge of obtaining a lease of a car by deception.

Weeks later, another charge was laid alleging she obtained whiteware worth $4462 by deception.

She pleaded guilty this year.

The con artist was due to be sentenced again today but a necessary probation report was not completed.

"On it goes," Judge Claire Ryan said. "It's the gift that keeps on giving. But for the victims, they keep on waiting and wondering."

The defendant set up the Givealittle page at the start of last year, and said she had six to nine months to live.

The page requested as many donations as possible so the supposed cancer sufferer could achieve her dreams before her death.

Judge Ryan previously spoke about the physical and mental health issues suffered by the fraudster with some scepticism.

The disorder the woman had been diagnosed with was not "life-threatening", she said.

At an earlier appearance, her lawyer, Alex Steedman, told the court the defendant had been hospitalised with stress-induced paralysis, which had affected the entire right side of her body.

The court heard the woman's underlying condition was likely "conversion disorder" - where extreme physical symptoms arose in response to stress.

Mr Steedman said she was also diagnosed as suffering from "major depression".

He said the woman had at least 50 hospital admissions on record and previously held up a large ring-binder folder - apparently one of nine such files - to show the volume of documents involved in her medical history.

He said that, despite suppression, the 24-year-old had been hounded on social media and had deleted her Facebook profile as a result.

The woman is now due to be sentenced in March.