The extradition hearing in the case of City Billionaire, Nazar Mohamed and his son, Azruddin Mohamed continued this morning in the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court with the Prosecuting Attorneys handing over additional pieces of evidence to make the case for the extradition. However, the Court heard that several other documents have not been properly processed through diplomatic channels as yet and remain unavailable.

The documents handed over today complement those earlier presented to the Court, which included a diplomatic note and warrants from the US authorities to support the US extradition request, according to Special Prosecutor, Terrence Williams.

The Mohameds are facing an 11-count indictment in Florida related to allegations of mail and wire fraud, money laundering connected to an alleged US$50M gold export and tax evasion scheme.

Inside the Courtroom, Defence Attorneys, Roysdale Forde SC, and Siand Dhurjon raised concern that the documents presented to the Court were not properly processed, but the Special Prosecutor assured that all documents will be properly processed before the case comes up again on Friday November 28.

Outside the Courtroom, Special Prosecutor Williams told reporters that the Prosecution completed the process of disclosure, providing the Court with the necessary evidence to support the extradition request.

“We submitted evidence supporting the request from the United States. And what has happened is that we were endeavoring to ensure that the Defence gets their copies as early as possible and in fact to meet this date, and so the copies were made from the documents prior to them coming through the diplomatic [channel],” Williams explained.

But while Williams indicated that the Prosecution has completed the process of disclosure, Defence Attorney Siand Dhurjon told reporters that additional documents are pending.

“Today as well as on the last occasion, they failed to provide all of the documents on which, they wish to use to rely on to extradite the Mohameds. They were ordered to make full disclosure on the last occasion. Today, they disclosed some documents but not all documents. They asked that they be indulged and permitted no later than this Friday to submit the rest,” Dhurjon told reporters.

He said it is important for all of the supporting documents to be handed over to the Court, and for them to be correctly processed through established diplomatic channels.

On Friday, the Defence is also expected to raise a number of Constitutional issues with the hope of having the case transferred to the High Court.

“We are working assiduously, and building on those points [constitutional points] on each passing day. We are waiting on the appropriate time to deploy them. At present now, it would be premature to deploy them until we have seen everything. Because new issues may be identified in those documents,” Dhurjon said.

Weighing in on the matter, Forde said the case raises a number of Constitutional issues which ought to be addressed by the High Court, and not the lower Court.

 “There is nothing that necessarily changes our position, in terms of our plans, and our course. But it would not be prudent for us to proceed without us first having all of the documents in our procession. We maintain that the constitutional arrangements that currently exist would require that this matter be referred to the High Court for the determination of a number of constitutional issues,” Forde explained.   

Further, Forde said at a glimpse, the documents tendered include no real evidence of crimes allegedly committed by the Mohameds, and according to him, do not link them to criminal networks in the US, Venezuela and or the Middle East, as previously stated by the Prosecution.

“As far as I recall, the allegations raised and the contention raise in the first hearing was that our clients were involved in the conduct or some sort of collaboration with Venezuela and the Middle East. No, nothing like that,” Forde said with Dhurjon adding that “there hasn’t been an allegation of such” in the official documents.  

The Attorneys will be back in Court before Senior Magistrate Judy Lathchman on Friday.

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