New surveillance footage circulating online appears to show Head of Special Branch, Senior Superintendent Prem Narine, standing on the right-hand side of Barr Street, Kitty, with a gun pointed and firing towards the vehicle carrying Opposition Leader Azruddin Mohamed and his two employees.
The recording captures Narine beside a building with his arm extended in the direction of the vehicle discharging several shots during the controversial October 12 incident outside his residence.
The footage provides another view of the confrontation, which led to the arrest and prosecution of Mohamed, his driver Eugene Thorne and Mario Mohamed.
Mohamed’s lawyers maintain that he neither possessed nor fired a gun and say the newly uncovered surveillance recordings support his account of what happened.
Their position comes amid reports that a Senior Science Officer of the Guyana Forensic Science Laboratory claimed that tests conducted on Mohamed and Thorne returned positive results for gunshot residue.
During earlier court proceedings, defence attorney Siand Dhurjon alleged that Mohamed had been the target of an assassination attempt by Narine. He also alleged that a firearm had been planted and requested CCTV recordings of the incident.
Mohamed, Thorne and Mario Mohamed appeared before Magistrate Faith McGusty on October 16 on charges involving alleged unlawful possession of a firearm, unlawful possession of ammunition and attempting to obstruct the course of justice. All three were granted bail.
Mohamed subsequently showed reporters recordings from several angles during a press conference, where he gave a detailed account of his version of the confrontation.
The obtaining and sharing of CCTV recordings later became the subject of a separate police investigation. Constable Ryan Greene, who was attached to the Guyana Police Force Command Centre at Liliendaal, was arrested on October 26, while Mohamed was arrested on October 28.
On October 30, Greene and Mohamed were jointly charged before Magistrate Abigail Gibbs at the Sparendaam Magistrate’s Court under the Cybercrime Act with unauthorisedly obtaining and giving electronic data.
The charge alleges that recordings relating to the shooting were obtained from a protected computer system at the Command Centre and passed to Mohamed without lawful excuse or justification.
Greene’s father has since filed a High Court application seeking bail for the constable. That application is scheduled to be heard on November 10 before Justice Zamilla Ally-Seepaul.
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