Privateer fined £80,000 over pensioner death
Thursday 06 October 2011
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EmailA social housing privateer has been fined £100,000 for health and safety breaches which led to the death of a 75-year-old man and a 40-year-old man being hospitalised.
Anthony Ironmonger died in hospital on December 17 2007 from multiple organ failure - days after suffering extensive burns in a bath at a Midland Heart hostel.
There were no temperature control valves fitted to taps in the bathroom, the Birmingham Crown Court heard on Wednesday.
Mr Ironmonger, who was partially sighted, had lived at Summer Hill House in Ladywood, Birmingham, for 10 years.
Sentencing the company, Judge William Davis QC said the pensioner's death was a "direct result" of the scalding which happened on the morning of December 6.
Midland Heart was fined £80,000 in relation to Mr Ironmonger and £20,000 in relation to a second man who sustained burns in a bath at another of its properties in 2008.
The court heard that a scheme to fit thermostatic mixer valves on all taps at Midland Heart properties had since been rolled out.
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