by Richard Matthews
An entrepreneur claims business at all three of his pubs has been ruined and his health wrecked by the actions of a council determined to destroy him.
Geoff Monks, who has run pubs for over 20 years, claims East Northamptonshire District Council has waged a vendetta against him culminating in a number of court cases and subsequent appeals.
Monks estimates that defending summonses has cost him around £150,000 in legal fees while the cost in lost business is more than £4m. At one stage he was sent to prison because he could not pay his fines, but subsequently suffered a heart attack before he could serve the sentence.
Two of his pubs are now closed while turnover at the third, the Snooty Fox at Lowick, near Kettering, has slipped from more than £1m to £200,000.
Monks claims his problems began when he barred a prominent local solicitor from his pub.
The solicitor subsequently claimed she had suffered food poisoning as a result of something she ate at the pub.
He later received a visit from the council's environmental health officers, and a year later, six summonses relating to food offences were served on him.
When the case came to court Monks was ordered to pay £27,500 in fines and costs, reduced to £20,000 on appeal.
It was when he went to court after asking for the fines to be reviewed that he suffered a heart attack and was unable to serve a four-month sentence.
The initial fine is believed to be the largest penalty against a sole trader for food safety offences in the country.
Magistrates then fined him £12,500 claimed to be another record fine after a mouse was reportedly seen at another pub he owned, the Samuel Pepys, even though the pub had passed a full pest-control inspection just a few weeks earlier.
He now faces further charges relating to alleged offences at the Vane Arms at Sudborough.
These relate to waste stored in an outhouse and a cracked window pane, which he said to his knowledge had been cracked for 17 years.
Monks said: "I have made complaints about the actions of council officers, but most of the senior figures in the environmental health department that were involved in the prosecutions against me have since left.
"All I know is that the actions of the council have totally destroyed my business."
The East Northamptonshire District Council has declined to comment.