A RESTAURATEUR charged with the manslaughter of a peanut allergy sufferer is set to face magistrates over allegedly selling a peanut-based curry to another customer with the allergy.

Northallerton Magistrates Court heard Mohammed Khalique Zaman would be charged with offering for sale a chicken korma described as free from peanuts that was unsafe and considered injurious to the health of a woman with a peanut allergy.

He also faces a charge of breaching the Food Safety Act 1990, by selling a chicken korma not of the nature substance or quality demanded by another female customer.

The charge, which follows an investigation by North Yorkshire County Council's Trading Standards, alleges that the curry had been labelled as being peanut-free - but contained peanuts.

Magistrates heard the 52-year-old would be summoned to the court next week to face charges under the Food Safety and Hygiene Regulations 2013, including publishing a menu leaflet, which described korma dishes as "a very mild, sweet, creamy dish cooked with coconut and almonds", rather than dishes which contained peanuts.

Zaman, who has run a string of award-winning restaurants in York and North Yorkshire for more than 25 years, will also be charged with offering for sale food the presentation of which is likely to mislead as to its nature, substance or quality.

Magistrates were told Trading Standards officers had believed they had handed over the charges to the Crown Prosecution Service, but it emerged they were not included in a preliminary hearing on April 24, when criminal charges against Zaman were heard at the court.

Magistrates court officials said the food safety charges would have to be read to the restaurateur before being sent to Teesside Crown Court to be heard alongside the criminal charges.

The restaurateur appeared at the crown court on Monday (May 11) charged over the manslaughter by gross negligence of 38-year-old peanut allergy sufferer Paul Wilson.

The deputy pub manager, of Helperby, near Thirsk, suffered a severe anaphylactic reaction and died after buying a curry from the Indian Garden, in Easingwold, North Yorkshire, in January last year.

Zaman was also charged with perverting the course of justice by forging a food safety training certificate and an immigration offence relating to the employee who served the contaminated meal.