Guyanese man accepts extradition to US for fraud charges; remanded to prison

A Guyanese national was on Thursday remanded to prison pending his extradition to the United States to face a series of fraud charges.
Ronley Bynoe appeared before acting Chief Magistrate Faith McGusty at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court, where he was told of the details of the application for extradition. Upon hearing the details, Bynoe informed the court that he does not wish to challenge the extradition.
Bynoe is wanted in the State of Ohio, where he was indicted by a federal grand jury on September 20, 2023, charging him with misuse of a Social Security number, aggravated identity theft, and two counts of bank fraud.
The man was committed to custody after indicating to the court that he would not be challenging the application for his extradition and is prepared to return to the US to face the indictments.
This matter comes on the heels of the pending extradition proceedings involving US-indicted Nazar Mohamed and his son Azruddin Mohamed.
The two men are wanted by US authorities to stand trial in a Florida federal court on 11 charges, including wire fraud, mail fraud and money laundering, allegedly linked to their gold trading operations.
Unlike Bynoe, however, the Mohameds, who are currently out on $150,000 bail each, are challenging their extradition. Those proceedings are ongoing before Magistrate Judy Latchman and have been adjourned on several occasions.
The delays stemmed from defence-filed constitutional challenges, applications for stays, appeals to the High Court, issues surrounding prosecutorial disclosures and at least one illness-related postponement. Although attempts were made to halt the process, the High Court has rejected bids to stop the hearings, allowing the extradition matter against the two men to continue in the Magistrates’ Court.
When the matter was called on Wednesday, the case was postponed again after the court was informed that Nazar continues to deal with health challenges.
At a February 9 hearing, the presiding Magistrate had adjourned the matter to February 16 after being informed that the elder Mohamed was unwell.
On February 16, the Magistrate issued an arrest warrant for Azruddin after he failed to attend court for the 09:00h hearing. She subsequently withdrew the warrant following an explanation from the defence. During that session, Nazar did not attend.
The matter was then adjourned again to Wednesday, and when the case was called, both the father and son attended, but no updated medical report was presented.
The defence explained that Nazar’s cardiologist is currently unavailable, and his recovery remains incomplete. As such, the court agreed to set the next hearing for February 26, allowing time for additional medical documentation to be prepared.
During the session, the prosecution indicated a desire to explore alternative procedures to advance the extradition, including the possibility of paper committal proceedings, in case the defendants cannot appear consistently in court. The defence maintained that such measures are premature and would raise procedural concerns, potentially requiring the case to restart from the beginning.
The Magistrate raised questions about whether the proposed approach would allow the defence adequate opportunity to review and challenge the evidence. Legal teams debated whether recent amendments to criminal procedure could apply to this case under the Fugitive Offenders Act, with the court inviting the prosecution to submit written arguments on the matter for the next hearing.
100 per cent committed
Meanwhile, despite the delays and prolonged proceedings, US Ambassador to Guyana Nicole Theriot has stated that the United States is fully committed to securing the extradition of the father-and-son duo.
“The US is 100 per cent committed to seeing this through,” the US diplomat told local news entity Newsroom on Wednesday, adding that “it is incredibly important to us that these proceedings continue and that a decision is ultimately made.”
Acknowledging the drawn-out nature of the case, she noted that “there have been a lot of delays, including today”, but noted that the United States remains hopeful that the matter will advance and that a decision will be reached.
Underscoring Washington’s seriousness, the Ambassador said, “The US Government does not spend tens of thousands of US taxpayer dollars to request extradition if we’re not serious. We want to see justice served, both for the Guyanese and the US people.”
At the same time, Theriot stressed that the United States respects Guyana’s legal process.
“We have to be respectful of the Guyanese judicial system; the ball is in your court, as they say… We are watching from afar. We are not interfering, but we are very, very interested in the outcome, and we are fully committed to seeing this through,” she stated.