A landlord has been hit with a fine after ignoring a court order to clear up mess.
Javaid Iqbal, 51, has been told to pay more than £1,300 in fines and costs after Stoke-on-Trent City Council decided to prosecute.
Council investigators were called in after residents complained about domestic waste, furniture, bricks, tiles, glass, scaffolding poles, planks and rubble being abandoned.
An enforcement notice was issued ordering Iqbal to clean up the site but he failed to undertake the work.
Rebecca Cooper, prosecuting said, “Complaints were received about the garden area at his property. A site visit was undertaken and waste material was found.
“An enforcement notice was sent which required the required the waste to be removed and taken to landfill and the land to cease to be used for the storage and importation of waste materials.
“The compliance period ended on February 1, 2017 and a site visit was undertaken on February 9 and the waste materials were still found so the notice wasn’t complied with.”
Iqbal pleaded guilty to breaching an enforcement notice at North Staffordshire Justice Centre.
However, he claimed the rubbish was mainly left there by a tenant who owed him £60,000 in rent and fly-tippers.
Mark Bromley, mitigating, said, “This is a property that he has owned for the past 10 years and he has never lived there himself. It is a fairly secluded and wouldn’t be seen by anybody travelling along Lightwood Road.
“The house has been rented and the last tenant was nothing but trouble by not paying rent and causing deliberate damage to the property. The tenant owed him up to £60,000 in unpaid rent.
“The vast majority of the waste has been deposited by the tenant and people driving up to the land and dumping it.
“Mr Iqbal decided that he would remove the tenant and he was evicted in October last year. It cost him £2,000 and took over a year. The masterplan was to get the tenant out and clear the site and because of this hassle he didn’t get round to clearing the site in the month he should have.
“Much of it now has been removed but he said that he intends to get some heavy machinery on site to level it out.”
