After almost nine years awaiting trial at the Demerara Assizes, Bishnauth Mohamed walked out of the Sexual Offences Court a free man on Monday following a unanimous not guilty verdict to an indictment of rape of a child under 16.
Freed: Bishnauth Mohamed
He was represented by attorney Maxwell McKay, while State attorney Lisa Cave prosecuted the case, and Justice Jo-Ann Barlow presided over the matter.
Mohamed had stood accused of a raping a five-year-old girl at a community in East Demerara between September 1-30, 2010. The jury deliberated for over three hours, and when the panel returned the verdict, all 12 members were in agreement that the defendant was not guilty of his alleged crime.
The former accused had always maintained that he was not guilty of the indictable offence for which he had been placed on bail. Court documents showed that while he was committed to stand trial in the High Court by Magistrate Sueanna Lovell in 2014, the deposition was filed nearly three years later, in 2017.
Guyana Times reported on Monday that some 61 per cent of the cases at the Demerara Assizes relate to matters of sexual offences.
