Munawar Ahmed, who owns the Chicken Inn and Takeaway in Church Street, Croydon, was given a 15 month suspended prison sentence and ordered to undertake 100 hours of unpaid work by Inner London Crown Court on Monday, October 7.
Ahmed’s company, Chicken Inn and Takeaway Limited, was ordered to pay fines totalling £17,000 and the Brigade’s court costs of £22,752. Ahmed and the company both pleaded guilty to seven offences under the Regulatory Reform (Fire safety) Order 2005.
Following fire safety concerns raised by Croydon Council’s housing enforcement team, London Fire Brigade’s fire safety inspecting officers visited the premises in January 2011.
Fire safety inspectors said there were no smoke alarms in the building; no fire separation between the shared kitchen on the first floor and staircase; no fire resistant or self-closing doors to the bedrooms on the first and second floors; no emergency lighting on the escape route from the upper floors and combustibles such as mattresses and cooking oil drums stored within the staircase enclosure on each floor.
No fire risk assessment had been carried out in the ground floor take-away or the common parts of the upper floors. A later inspection, in January 2012, found evidence that the prohibition notice had been breached.
London Fire Brigade’s assistant commissioner for fire safety regulation Steve Turek said: “This verdict should serve as a stark warning to landlords and business owners that they have a responsibility under fire safety laws to ensure that people living and working in their premises are safe from the risk of fire.
“If we find people are ignoring these responsibilities we won’t hesitate to prosecute and the sentence handed down in this case shows that the courts take these matters just as seriously as we do.”
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