Fines and prosecutions Landlord jailed following fatal house fire


KAMAL BAINS was sentenced to a year in jail for failing to fit smoke alarms at a Huddersfield property, where a fire claimed the lives of two young children. Huddersfield Daily Advertiser and


The Telegraph reported on the trial and sentencing of Mr Bains, who had been said to have ‘ignored pleas’ for fire alarms at the property. His trial at Leeds Crown Court related to the fire at his property in Fartown in February 2017, in which two year old Jake Casey and three year old Logan Taylor lost their lives. Mr Bains had been charged


with two counts of gross negligence manslaughter – which he denied – when the two boys died ‘after being overcome by smoke’, from a fire that started in their bedroom at the rented property. Both were rescued by firefighters but were pronounced dead in hospital, while their mother Emma Taylor and their older brother Finley managed to escape. The landlord was accused


of an ‘inexcusable failure’ to provide smoke alarms, prosecutor Allan Compton telling the jury that the fire started due to an electrical fault in the television in the boys’ bedroom. Ms Taylor tried to rescue them but was unable to, and Mr Compton stated that the fire was fatal ‘not because it developed swiftly and uncontrollably’ but because the lack of smoke alarms meant it ‘had taken hold to such an extent’ that attempts to rescue them ‘were unsuccessful’. The prosecutor said that


Mr Bains ‘was responsible for an inexcusable failure to ensure that 256 Alder Street was equipped with working smoke alarms. It was a tragedy, we say, that was eminently avoidable’. Ms Taylor and her partner had ‘repeatedly asked’ Mr Bains to install alarms ‘from the day they moved into the property’ in April 2015, and the house was in a ‘poor state’ when they moved in as a result of mould in the kitchen, a ‘condemned’ gas fire and ‘cracked plugs’.


Mr Bains had admitted to police later that the house was ‘the worst


me off.’ The manslaughter charges were dropped, but he admitted violating health and safety regulations passed in October 2015 that require private sector landlords to ‘have at least one smoke alarm installed on every storey of their properties’. The judge told Mr Bains: ‘Your


property on his books’, and Ms Taylor had been keen to ask about alarms, as her eldest child had ‘started a fire at a previous property by putting a tea towel on a gas ring’. Mr Compton added that: ‘If ever there was an address to prioritise in ensuring alarms were present it would be 256 Alder Street.’ Previous tenants had also complained about a lack of alarms, with one told ‘she needed to fit one herself’. Also, Mr Bains had told police that alarms were installed when the family moved in ‘but fire investigators found no trace of any alarms’, and that the conditions would have been ‘untenable’ around 17 minutes after the fire began. Tests had shown that a smoke alarm on the upstairs landing would have activated within 10 to 11 minutes, which would have given Ms Taylor ‘five minutes to rescue her children’. Mr Bains would have been ‘fully


aware of this’, Mr Compton adding that the former had told detectives ‘all of his properties had smoke alarms but tenants would take them down when they sounded’. Ms Taylor told the jury that she had asked him ‘time after time’ to fit alarms, adding: ‘I was fed up with my kids living in danger because he can’t be bothered to fit a smoke alarm. He said he would do it but he never did.’


She also described one incident


in which she showed Mr Bains a story about alarm regulations, and added: ‘He didn’t really seem bothered. As long as he got his rent money, he was happy for me to live like that with my kids. He just fobbed


failure to fit smoke alarms was a significant cause of the children’s deaths. Thus the harm caused by your failure could not have been more serious.’ Ms Taylor said: ‘I don’t think I will ever recover from this awful tragedy. The worst thing is I won’t get to see my boys grow up.’ She and Mr Casey, the boys’


father, added: ‘We do hope that this case highlights this important issue and for people to know their responsibilities as landlords or letting agents and to take appropriate action to ensure that any property they are responsible for has working smoke alarms. Such a simple check could have saved the lives of our boys and we want to ensure that this does not happen to anyone else.’ Detective Superintendent


Steve Thomas of West Yorkshire Police added: ‘We also hope that this case is a stark reminder to landlords and letting agents to treat their responsibilities seriously, and they have an obligation to ensure that all properties are fully equipped with all adequate safety measures to ensure the safety of their tenants.’ Dave Walton, chief fire officer


for West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service, commented: ‘Had there been working smoke alarms in this property, the outcome could have been very different and these brothers could have had a future to look forward to. As firefighters, the importance of having working smoke alarms is a message that we try and get over to the public day in and day out. This landmark case shows how vitally important it is that landlords and letting agents take their responsibilities seriously or the consequences do not bear thinking about.’


www.frmjournal.com SEPTEMBER 2018 13


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