'Rats and bugs' restaurant fined £36,000

THE owner of a Korean restaurant has been fined £28,000 after a cockroach was found crawling inside a saucepan.

Health inspectors investigated the Jin Korean Restaurant in Bateman Street, Soho, after "countless" sightings of rats, mice and bugs.

Prosecutor Sarah Selby told City of Westminster magistrates' court that a decaying mouse was found in a lift shaft and kitchen wall tiles were buckling, suggesting a cockroach infestation.

Inspectors found raw chicken stored next to salad and defrosting fish in open buckets on the floor.

Staff did not wash their hands before or after cooking and were unable to explain how to clean the kitchen.

Owner Myoung Kim, 57, and manager Uoong Shin, 38, both pleaded guilty to eight breaches of health and safety regulations. Kim was fined £28,000 and Shin, who was in charge of health and safety, £8,000. They were ordered to pay costs totalling £2,015.28.

Judge Alexandra Lavery said: "Any of your customers could have died from catching a disease."

Kim has now sold the restaurant.