Restaurant owner fails in bid to overturn nut allergy death verdict

A RESTAURANT owner whose “appalling” business practices led to the death of a customer with a severe peanut allergy has failed in a bid to have his manslaughter conviction overturned.

Paul Wilson, 38, suffered a severe anaphylactic shock in January 2014 after eating a takeaway curry containing peanuts from the Indian Garden in Easingwold.

The bar manager, from Helperby, “took no chances” after being diagnosed with an allergy so severe it could be triggered by him being in close proximity to a peanut, and had told staff his meal must not contain any nuts.

Mohammed Khalique Zaman, who owned the restaurant and four others in York and North Yorkshire, was found guilty of his manslaughter and six charges of breaching food safety rules.

Jurors were told he had cut corners to save money by ordering cheaper ingredients, which included peanuts, because his business had amassed debts of £300,000.

Staff at the restaurant had been warned by a trading standards official just one week before Mr Wilson’s death that customers must be told their meals contained peanuts after a customer suffered an allergic reaction at another of Zaman’s restaurants.

The 55-year-old, of Aylesham Court, Huntington, was jailed for six years at Teesside Crown Court in May last year. He challenged his conviction for manslaughter at London’s Court of Appeal, with his lawyers arguing it was “unsafe” as he did not receive a fair trial. They said the jury was “misdirected” by the judge in his summing up of the case.

But, dismissing his appeal, Lord Justice Hickinbottom said: “The case against Zaman was powerful. We are in no doubt that the conviction was and is safe.”