Rogue Bradford landlord used AI to fake smoke detector

Imran Hussain, prosecuting on behalf of Bradford Council, told the court that last May the council had received a complaint that 18 Fairfax Avenue was being used as an unauthorised five-bedroom HMO.

He said: “The owner had leased the premises to the defendant who had gone on to sublet the premises to other individuals without telling the owner.”

Magistrates were told that the tenants were all unrelated, with Hussain adding: “It met the definition of a licensable HMO, but there was no record of an HMO licence ever being issued.”

Tenants paid their rent to Instyle Aviation, which has Palaima listed as the sole director.

Despite the name, Companies House says Instyle Aviation specialised in takeaway food shops and residential property management.

Officers inspected the property shortly after, and found that some rooms had no fire escape windows no fire doors and no fire detection systems.

Hussain said: “This caused an imminent risk of serious harm. Due to this risk an emergency prohibition order was served ordering him to immediately install smoke alarms.

“The defendant agreed to do this that very day.

“He joked that he could just send the officer an AI-generated image. The officer said he should be taking this extremely seriously.

“He later sent photos purporting to show a smoke detector where there was previously no smoke detector.

“The image was believed to be AI-generated. He sent that image showing a smoke detector on the ceiling on 27 October at 10.30pm. The following day at 11:30am officers re-visited the property and saw there was no smoke detector on the ceiling – confirming their suspicion that this was an AI image.

“The fire safety risks were just too high and an emergency prohibition notice was served on the property.”