Landlords found guilty after housing 31 people in four-bed home

Three family members who received £112,000 a year by housing 31 people into a four-bedroom home in Wembley, have been found guilty of breaching landlord licensing rules.

The defendants were mother and daughter Harsha and Chandani Shah, along with Mrs Harsha Shah's brother, Sanjay Shah. Jaydipkumar Valand, who collected the rent off the tenants for the Shah family, pleaded guilty at a trial in December last year.

The four defendants are to be sentenced at the Crown Court at a later date.

The judge at Willesden Magistrates Court this week (23 May) said: "This trial has revealed how people desperate for accommodation in London can be exploited and have paid to live in grossly overcrowded, unhygienic and unsafe conditions."

The judge also ordered the defendants to pay the local authority £35,000 in costs.

Brent Council said its enforcement officers had found a woman living in a lean-to shed in the back garden of the property, on Napier Road, during a raid on the premises in July 2016. The structure had no lighting or heating and was made out of wood offcuts, pallets and tarpaulin.

Inside the house, officers found some residents sharing a single bed with night workers swapping sleeping shifts with those who worked during the day. Four beds were discovered in the front room and three in each bedroom.

Spencer Randolph, Head of Private Housing Services at Brent, said: "This judgement sends out a clear message that Brent has a zero tolerance policy towards landlords who break the law and exploit vulnerable tenants.

"The lean-to shack we found in the back garden of the property in July last year looked like something you would expect to find in a Hollywood depiction of a shanty town.

"We will prosecute any landlord or agent we find housing tenants in cramped or hazardous conditions. Brent's aim is to help renters by ensuring decent living conditions within the borough."

Brent said fines paid to the courts by landlords following successful prosecutions it had brought, had passed the half a million pound mark. It brings two to five prosecutions every month.