While the majority of food businesses – 94% – pass safety inspections, there are a handful that fail to meet standards so flagrantly that not only are they shut down, but their owners are prosecuted. More than 100 businesses were successfully prosecuted in the year to April 2016, with sentences including prison, suspended sentences, community service and fines of tens of thousands of pounds. Here are some of the worst cases seen by food safety inspectors:
Golden Dragon, Plaistow, east London
Golden Dragon has entered into the realm of mythology among environmental health officers at Newham council in east London.
The Chinese takeaway on Barking Road was, they say, the worst business they have seen. In a borough with the worst food safety scores in London, where more than 50% of takeaways fail inspections, that is saying something.
Inspectors were tipped off in late 2014 about the business, but Edward King, the officer who went to inspect it, twice found it closed. On the third visit he stood outside the building and waited. When he saw the shutters open and a man on a moped leave the premises with a delivery on the back, he ducked under the shutters and conducted an inspection.
Matthew Collins, the principal environmental officer, said: “The back [of the restaurant] was absolutely terrible. There was pest infestation, no means of disinfectant, they were cooking wearing dirty clothes.”
Photographs from the inspection show large uncovered saucepans full of food cooling inches away from rubbish bags, cockroaches and rodent droppings. Inspectors shut down the premises immediately.
The team wanted to prosecute the owner, but were never able to locate them. The business has since closed.
Karachi Karahi, Plaistow, east London
The Karachi Karahi restaurant, also in Newham, catered an event for the Sindhi Association of Europe in August 2013, during which 32 people suffered food poisoning. The most likely cause was a chicken biryani, a Public Health England report concluded.
One woman who attended the event died the day after, but a judge later ruled there was insufficient evidence to prove the death was caused by food poisoning.
The restaurant had been repeatedly served with improvement notices in the lead-up to the food poisoning outbreak and had already closed down once due to food hygiene reasons.
Kamran and Farhana Memon, the husband and wife owners of Karachi Karahi, were sentenced at Snaresbrook crown court in January after being found guilty of supplying unsafe food. They were sentenced to 150 hours of community service each and ordered to pay £25,000 toward the council’s costs for prosecution. They were also banned from operating a food business for five years.
Chai Wallah, Yarm, Stockton-on-Tees
The owner of this Indian restaurant was given a three-month prison sentence for eight food safety offences.
Officers inspected Chai Wallah in September 2014 after receiving complaints from customers, one of which alleged that they had been sold chicken that was raw in the middle.
An inspection revealed significant issues at the restaurant.
Rob Llewellyn, the principal environmental health officer at Stockton council, who has worked as an inspector for 23 years, said: “It’s one of those where you walk in and it’s in an exceptionally poor condition. It was filthy and not in good repair.
“From a hygiene perspective, it was among the worst I’ve ever seen.”
He cited multiple offences at the restaurant, including lack of hand-washing facilities, food kept at room temperature and a serious accumulation of dirt, grease and food debris. Most alarming was the cross-contamination caused from filthy cleaning cloths being left on benches where food was prepared and on top of food. Llewellyn said the absence of pests at the restaurant was a miracle given the conditions.
The owner of the business, Alomgir Qureshi, was also found guilty of immigration offences and being in breach of a nine-month suspended sentence in 2013 for employing illegal immigrants at another cafe.
Babylon Inn, Croydon, south London
The owners of Babylon Inn were hit with fines of more than £90,000 last December, one of the highest financial penalties to be issued in 2015.
A food safety inspector from Croydon council who investigated Babylon Inn said: “Often when we go to businesses it’s not just one problem; with this, everything was wrong.”
The inspector, who did not wish to be named, cited a litany of problems at the restaurant, including electrical, health and safety and food hygiene issues. Among these were broken glass in food preparation areas, unsealed walls and ceilings, building rubble and disused equipment strewn throughout kitchens, and carbonised grease on cooking equipment. Although building works were being carried out in the kitchen, it was still used to prepare food. On top of this, inspectors found evidence of rats, mice and cockroaches.
“You sometimes get mice and cockroaches, or rats and cockroaches, or rats and mice, but it’s rare to get all three,” the inspector said.
In less than four years, inspectors visited the restaurant for five official inspections, as well as follow-up visits, and found continual breaches of hygiene.
Dr Mardan Mahmood, the director of Babylon Inn, was fined more than £40,000, including costs; his ex-wife Hendi Hamude was made to pay more than £17,000, and the company, owned by Mahmood, was ordered to pay more than £35,000. Mahmood has been banned from managing any food business indefinitely.
