London sushi store caught breaking food safety laws
The owner of a sushi and grocery store in New Malden, in the southwest London borough of Kingston-upon-Thames, has been prosecuted after she was caught breaching food hygiene regulations.
After inspecting the premises and finding multiple breaches of food safety laws, the local council made the decision to prosecute. As well as failing on general standards of food hygiene training, the violations found at the Jin Mi store included:
- Failure to provide handwashing facilities for staff in food preparation areas
- Failure to control the risk of E.coli contamination by allowing customers to use the same implements to serve themselves both raw and cooked meats
- Failure to keep the premises and equipment clean
- Failure to provide employees with proper overclothes
The owner of the business, Sooryun Kim, had previously been issued warnings to improve standards by Kingston Council. However, the shop owners did not act on warnings to improve standards and ended up admitting eight food hygiene breaches at Richmond Magistrates’ Court. The business owners were fined £4,000 and ordered to pay £1,200 in court costs.
Commenting on the case, Councillor Simon James said:
“I hope that this prosecution sends out a strong message that the council takes any breach of the law and risk to public health extremely seriously.”