Vue cinema fined £750,000 over death of dad crushed in seat

Accident ‘never should have happened’, judge says

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A cinema chain has been hit with a £750,000 fine for safety breaches after a man died after getting trapped under a faulty chair.

Vue Entertainment, which has sites 91 sites across the UK and Ireland, was also ordered to pay £130,000 in costs.

Ateeq Rafiq, a father-of-one, died at the company's Birmingham Star City complex in March 2018.

He suffered a cardiac arrest after the motorised footrest of his "gold class" chair clamped down on his neck.

He had been kneeling down on the floor while looking for his keys, a 2019 inquest heard.

Mr Rafiq, of Aston, was revived by paramedics at the scene and taken to hospital but died a week later from "catastrophic" brain injuries.

In April 2021 Vue Entertainment Ltd pleaded guilty to failing to carry out an adequate risk assessment and to failing to ensure the safety of its customers.

Handing down the fine, judge Heidi Kubik QC said he death of the 24-year-old was an accident that "never should have happened".

On the first day of the 2019 inquest, which recorded a verdict of accidental death, a Health and Safety Executive investigator said Mr Rafiq’s chair was one of eight in the 52-seat cinema on which the footrest was impossible to lift by hand.

Judge Kubik added: "It is conceded that clearly a number of members of the public were exposed to the same risk of harm.

"The complete lack of a risk assessment was a significant cause of the actual harm that resulted."

Vue said in a statement: "The death of Mr Rafiq saddened everybody at Vue and we remain deeply sorry for the loss suffered by his family and friends.

"We hope that the end of these proceedings brings some closure to them following this tragic accident.

"All recliners of the type involved in the incident have been removed from our cinemas and we have taken all possible steps to learn from this and ensure it could not happen again."