A WOMAN who tried to illegally enter the country used a fake identity card to attempt to get access to NHS treatment.

Stelina Resuli used a fake Italian passport to try to enter the UK in 2019, but after she was found out by Border Force, she applied for leave to remain and was sent to a bail hostel.

However, she fled and “went to ground”, eventually surfacing in Malmesbury whilst living in a flat above a restaurant on Oxford Street.

The Albanian national, who fled her home country after she was threatened by a former boyfriend into getting into the sex trade, paid 300 euros for a fake Spanish ID card, Swindon Crown Court heard on Wednesday.

Resuli used the ID card to attempt to get NHS treatment, whilst she was also working at La Campagna, an Italian restaurant in Malmesbury, for six months, prosecutor Rob Welling said.

She was arrested in April after a joint Immigration and police operation.

Her barrister, Alex Daymond, told the court: “She felt she did not have time to apply through the normal channels.”

Having pleaded guilty to one count of possessing an identity document with improper intent, she was jailed for three months in a hearing on Wednesday, whilst her now-boyfriend, Elvis Kacani, was put behind bars for four months on Friday (May 20).

He had admitted one count of possessing an identity document with improper intent, one count of possessing improperly obtained identity documents and one count of working when disqualified by reason of immigration status.

The same courthouse heard on that occasion that the 29-year-old, who also lived on Oxford Street in Malmesbury, had used one of two fake documents - an Italian ID card and an Italian driving licence -to gain work at La Campagna.

Sentencing Resuli, Judge Jason Taylor QC said on Wednesday: “Your tale is a familiar one, and the court is not unsympathetic for people who may seek to leave their country of origin.

“But the fact is you will understand the seriousness of which these charges are viewed.

“Your co-accused was sentenced [on Friday], he was in a slightly more serious position than you.”

The 22-year-old’s three-month sentence will end “in the not too distant future”, when the time she has spent in custody since her arrest is taken into account.

The same is likely for Kacani, Mr Welling said before the hearing.