A Kilburn landlord who illegally converted a Harlesden hotel into 26 squalid flats has been given three months to pay more than £338,000 in fines.
Nihal Seneviratne and his company, NSV Management Ltd, turned a former hotel in Nicoll Road into 26 studio flats back in 2011 without seeking permission from the Brent Council.
This allowed the 59-year-old landlord, who lives in Kings Garden, West End Lane, Kilburn, to cheat more than 100 vulnerable tenants into paying thousands of pounds for sub-standard accommodation.
The thin-walled studio flats measured between nine m2 and 20m2. Tenants were subjected to poor insulation, bad maintenance and insanitary conditions.
The council issued Seneviratne with a planning enforcement notice in March 2012, but he failed to comply. He was finally convicted on September 5 2016.
His appeal against the conviction was dismissed at Harrow Crown Court in January and confiscation proceedings began.
On August 30 NSV Management was issued with a £300, 650 confiscation order under the Proceeds of Crime Act.
Mr Seneviratne was also ordered to pay £20,000 in fines as well as £18,268 to cover the council’s costs.
He has three months to pay the confiscation order in full, which will be distributed between the government, the courts and the council.
Meanwhile Wembley landlord Shyam Popat who kept 24 adults and children in appalling conditions in a two-bedroom flat in Ealing Road has been fined more than £10,000.
Squashed into six bedrooms and two smaller rooms, the tenants endured overcrowding, cockroaches and fire safety hazards while paying Popat rent.
Popat pleaded guilty to breaching the conditions of his multiple occupancy licence at Willesden Magistrates’ Court on August 31.
He also failed to provide up-to-date certificates, tenancy documents or protection for his tenants’ deposits. He was fined £6,000 for breaching the conditions and ordered to pay £3,953 in costs.
Cllr Harbi Farah, lead member for housing and welfare reform, said: “Brent Council will make sure that rogue landlords will not benefit in any way from their crimes.”
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