Director Fakhar Zaman pleaded guilty to five charges on behalf of the company Mohammadi Sweets & Restaurant Ltd and five similar ones against himself at the hearing on Monday (October 26).

A Birmingham eatery which suffered separate pest infestations within six months of each other has been hit with a £30,000 court bill.

Birmingham Magistrates were told a mouse infestation was discovered at Mohammadi Sweets and Restaurant in Stratford Road on February 25 2025 whilst cockroaches were found during an inspection August 7 last year.

Maria Angeliki-Lazari, prosecuting, said the kitchen was also found to be dirty with a build up of grease, carbon and food debris on both occasions while no procedures were in place to tackle pests.

Director Fakhar Zaman pleaded guilty to five charges on behalf of the company Mohammadi Sweets & Restaurant Ltd and five similar ones against himself at the hearing on Monday (October 26).

In mitigation, the court heard the issues came during the height of the city’s bin strikes and that Zaman had previously hired a manager to run the business before taking back control in light of the problems.

The hearing also heard that pest control measures were in place in August but not sufficient enough to deal with the issues.

Following the February visit, a hygiene emergency prohibition notice was served on the business, forcing it to close for a few days before the risk had been eliminated and the premises allowed to reopen.

Ms Angeliki-Lazari said a follow-up visit in April showed no issues and that all the works had been completed.

But she said, following the discovery of cockroaches on the first visit in August, officers returned on six occasions before the necessary works had been completed on August 19.

She said: “This is a double breach and a flagrant disregard for the law. There were a number of visits that had taken place and the situation had not improved.

“The business was clearly aware of the situation as there were cockroaches all over the kitchen and they should have taken steps to address this.

“(In February)Mouse droppings were all over. The business would have been aware of it and had no procedures in place.”

Lucinda Wilmott-Lascelles, defending, said: “This business is on a busy thoroughfare. It is surrounded by other food shops and many small businesses.

“These offences took place at a time Birmingham City Council were not collecting rubbish.

“The rubbish at that point of the crisis was stacked up in the street and impacted on small businesses abilities to stay on top of pest control.

“The defendant does not excuse at all that which we came to see but it added to an already present problem.

“The first (issues) in February were fixed in a very short period and then continued to trade.”

She said pest control companies visited the business in July and no fresh activity was reported until the issues with cockroaches arose in August.

During August, she said the business remained closed with the shutters down for most of the revisits whilst dealing with the issues.

She said: “They accept the conditions that came to be seen were unacceptable. They had measures in place but were not enough to deal with the rise in pests which there are across the city.

“They have tried at each step to put in place these measures and they have been allowed to continue to trade.”

She added: “Mr Zaman takes no wage and works at a second shop to be paid a wage. It is a business in dire financial circumstances.

“I asked him ‘what is the plan?’ He said ‘I’ll just have to keep working hard to turn this around.”

Magistrates fined the company £18,000 and ordered it to pay a £7,200 surcharge and costs of £1,902. Zaman was fined £1,399 and ordered to pay a victim surcharge of £560 and costs of £1,902.