Taxi driver Johnny Boodram was freed today after Principal Magistrate Faith McGusty upheld a no-case submission on his behalf in the fatal Mobil gas station bombing. Three others charged in connection with the blast were committed to stand trial in the High Court.
Magistrate McGusty handed down the ruling in Court Five of the Georgetown Magistrate’s Courts. She upheld the submission by Boodram’s attorney, Mikel Puran, and discharged him. Daniel Alexander Ramirez Poedemo, Krystal LaCruz and Alexander Bettencourt were committed for trial. The magistrate found there was sufficient evidence for LaCruz and Bettencourt to answer allegations that they assisted Poedemo in carrying out the offence.
Poedemo is accused of carrying out the bombing, while LaCruz and Bettencourt are charged with aiding and abetting a terrorist act. Boodram had faced the same aiding and abetting charge. Stabroek News reported at the time of the first court appearance that Puran said Boodram was a Region Three taxi driver who regularly transported LaCruz and maintained that his client had been wrongly implicated.
Last month, attorneys for Boodram, LaCruz and Bettencourt had made no-case submissions, arguing that the prosecution had failed to establish a case against their clients. Prosecutor Mandel Moore responded after the prosecution completed tendering its evidence in July. Earlier this year, Poedemo told the court that he alone was responsible and asked that the other three be freed. He later withdrew his guilty plea.
Six-year-old Soraya Bourne was killed in the October 26, 2025 explosion at the Mobil gas station at Regent and King streets, Georgetown. She was in a car with relatives when the blast occurred. Her aunt Jenica Hooper, grandmother Yvonne Jonas and two other children, Seddia McIntosh and Reshard Lord, were injured, Stabroek News reported.
Seven people were initially charged in connection with the bombing. In separate proceedings at the Leonora Magistrate’s Court in April, Wayne Correia and Ramesh Pramdeo were discharged after Magistrate Alisha George upheld no-case submissions. Jennifer Rodriguez was committed to stand trial in the High Court. On the first anniversary of the bombing, Bourne’s relatives gathered outside the station to demand justice.
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