In a warning to developers who flout planning laws that they will be stripped of their ill-gotten gains, a man who converted a single home into flats without permission has been ordered to pay more than £100,000 under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002.
The developer had ignored local authority demands that he return the property to a single dwelling house and was fined £10,000 by a judge after he admitted two counts of failing to comply with a planning enforcement notice. He was subsequently also hit with a £105,009 confiscation order, representing the entirety of his realisable assets.
In dismissing his challenge to that order, the Court of Appeal noted that his benefit from the offences had been assessed at £147,600. His £35,000 equity in his matrimonial home had rightly been included in the order and he was ‘fortunate’ that prosecutors had not held out for an even higher figure.
R v Mortada. Case Number: 201301177