Smethwick man handed suspended sentence after dumping bags of rubbish on city street

Adrian Bivolaru took plastic bags filled with insulation waste out of his Mercedes van and left them in Little Edward Street in Digbeth, Birmingham, in March last year.

Birmingham City Council officers searched the dumped waste and found evidence linking it to a business. 

Enquiries with the business then identified that on March 13, 2024, it paid a waste removals company £160 to remove waste from its premises.

The city council was able to discover the vehicle used to remove the rubbish. Checks of the registration plate confirmed that Bivolaru was the insurance policyholder and only named driver on the policy.

It was then discovered that the van had entered an area of the city's Clean Air Zone in close proximity to Little Edward Street on six occasions between March 13 and March 20, 2024.

Bivolaru was issued with notices under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 requiring him to provide details of the driver of the van on March 13 and provide proof that he had legitimate arrangements for the disposal of his trade waste. 

He however failed to respond to any of these notices, Birmingham City Council said.

Adrian Bivolaru, aged 35 and of Parkhill Road, Smethwick, was charged with depositing controlled waste, allowing controlled waste to be deposited from his vehicle, and two charges of failing to supply information to a waste enforcement officer.

At Birmingham Magistrates Court on Monday (March 24), he was sentenced for 13 weeks each for an offence of depositing controlled waste and an offence of allowing controlled waste to be deposited to run consecutively, suspended for two years. 

Bivolaru was also fined a total of £200 for failing to supply information. 

In a separate incident in Weoley Castle, near Bourneville, Birmingham, a substantial amount of fly-tipping was discovered on June 13, 2023, in Silvington Close. 

Evidence within the waste identified an individual who paid a waste removal company to take their waste away. 

Further enquiries then identified their rubbish had been collected by Bivolaru, who at the time was director of removal services company, Ady Bivolaru Ltd.

Councillor Majid Mahmood, Birmingham City Council cabinet member for environment and transport, said: “This was a terrible case of environment vandalism, with piles of commercial waste left strewn across the road. 

"People who do this have no care for the community or people who live and work in the area. 

"As this case demonstrates, we will prosecute when we have evidence so I would urge people to report this sort of behaviour. Well done to the team that investigated and brought the case to court.”