HGP Nightly News – A police statement about a key witness’s evidence sparked a sharp exchange in the Mohameds’ extradition case on Monday, but Chief Magistrate Judy Latchman made clear she would not read it.
“I don’t want to see it,” Latchman told defence attorney Siand Dhurjon at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court. She said her decision in the committal proceedings against Nazar and Azruddin Mohamed would be based on evidence properly presented in court, not on police releases or media reports.
Dhurjon had raised concerns about a September 11 Guyana Police Force (GPF) release addressing records that Senior Superintendent Prem Narine said he destroyed. The defence contends that the release mischaracterised Narine’s testimony and was issued while he remained under cross-examination.
The GPF says it was correcting media reports. It maintains that Narine preserved and tendered the official records relevant to the proceedings, and that the material he destroyed consisted of working notes containing no additional evidence omitted from his statement.
The defence disputes that account. In a September 18 letter to Police Commissioner Clifton Hicken, Senior Counsel Roysdale Forde said Narine had not given the evidence attributed to him in the police release.
Defence lawyers have pointed to Narine’s testimony that he shredded and burned three books in January 2026. He said he believed one contained a note about an interaction between the Mohameds and US law-enforcement official Sandy Rao after their arrest. Narine acknowledged that the interaction was not recorded in the Brickdam Police Station diary or included in his police statement.
Dhurjon argued that the police release could affect public perceptions of the evidence and asked the court to send a strong message against what the defence considers misreporting of testimony.
Latchman declined to examine the statement or hear its contents. “I have sequestered my mind,” she said, explaining that she had not been paying attention to reports about the case. She told the defence it could take whatever action it considered appropriate over the release.
