Custodial sentence for London meat trader

A meat trader who supplied unfit chicken across London and the South East while processing kebabs in a cement mixer has been jailed, fined over £50,000 and banned from trading in the future.
The case follows an investigation by EHOs from Sevenoaks DC into Mr Sakru Ahmet, 60, of East Rochester Way, Sidcup and his company UK Chicken Doner & Poultry.
The company supplied meat to takeaways and other food business across London and the South East from units at Upper Hockenden Farm, Maidstone Rd in Swanley.
During the investigation EHOs seized almost 12 tones of unfit meat that had expired or had no sell by date that had to be destroyed by the council.
The case started in November 2015 when Mr Ahmet first notified the council of his intention to set up a food business. When told that he would be required to get council approval he claimed in January 2016 he would not be processing meats.
In February three EHO inspections revealed that Mr Ahmet was indeed trading in meats resulting in the seizure of poultry. A converted cement mixer was also found that was being used to process meats.
Legal action was taken to prevent him from trading further while a warrant was issued to allow EHOs to enter the property and remove documents.
A subsequent investigation found that Mr Ahmet has already been trading for a year prior to him contacting the council without any approval and that was misleading his customers by falsely labelling German made donner kebabs as British.
Meat was ready to be sold that had passed its use-by date or had no clear use-by dates on it, while there was no record of when meats had been produced, frozen or processed.
Mr Ahmet and his company pleaded guilty to 21 food safety charges in March 2017. He was sentenced last week at Maidstone Crown Court to four months in prison. He was ordered to pay half the council court costs of £11,880 while his company was fined £30,000 and orders to pay the other half of the costs totalling £53,760.
The councils also successfully applied for a prohibition order to prevent Mr Ahmet from managing any food business in the future.
Matthew Dickins, cabinet member for Sevenoaks DC said: ‘This is one of the most serious breaches of food safety laws the council has ever come across. Mr Sukru Ahmet and his company had no regard for the food safety laws that exist to protect the public. The substantial fine/custodial sentence handed down by the court demonstrates the seriousness of the case.’