Landlord jailed for fire safety offences after fatal blaze

Landlord jailed for fire safety offences after fatal blaze

A landlord has been jailed for four months and ordered to pay £10,000 costs after pleading guilty to three offences under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005.
Lookman Adeyemi – the landlord and registered owner of a house in multiple occupation in Milton Keynes where a mother and her daughter died in a fire in 2010 – was sentenced at Amersham Law Courts on 29 March. He had previously pleaded guilty on 8 March to failing to:

• make a suitable and sufficient fire risk assessment
• ensure that, in the event of danger, it was possible for people to evacuate the premises as quickly and as safely as possible
• provide sufficient detectors and alarm at the premises.

Sentencing him, Justice Lord Parmoor said: "Although your failings did not cause the fire, the fact that one of your tenants and a child died is some indication of the risk run by your tenants, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
"You were not dealing with rich people. These were people, some of whom did not have a job. You were dealing with a very vulnerable clientele."