Latest update April 6th, 2025 11:06 AM
Latest News
- High Court bars GRA from seizing Team Mohamed’s luxury vehicles
- Oil spill will hit Guyana’s shores before capping stack arrives to plug leak
- UN says 100 children killed or injured in Gaza every day since war resumed
- Guyana received US$605M oil money in first quarter of 2025
- ‘Tariff war’ spells grave danger for the Region – CARICOM Chair Mottley
High seas Pirates found guilty of killing Fishermen in 2018 attack
Kaieteur News – The two men who were on trial at the Berbice High Court before Justice Navindra Singh were yesterday found guilty of murder by a 12-member jury for the deadly piracy attack that killed Tilaknauth Mohabir called ‘Kaiman’ and Mahesh Sarjoo back in 2018.
The victims were on board fishing vessel, ‘Romina SK 764’ at the time. The charge read that Nakool Manohar called ‘Fyah’, 40 of Lot 1 No. 43 Village, Corentyne, Berbice and Premnauth Persaud, 44, between April 27, 2018, and May 3rd, 2018, murdered Mohabir and Sarjoo while committing piracy in Corentyne waters. They were charged jointly.
Premnauth Persaud called ‘Sanba
Manohar and Persaud Sanbad’ had both pleaded not guilty earlier this month and subsequent to that, a Jury was empanelled, and a trial commenced with a number of witnesses taking the stand in person and virtually. Following the summing up of the case by Justice Singh yesterday the Jury retired to deliberate. After about two hours, they returned with a unanimous decision of a guilty verdict for both men on both counts. Probation reports for both men were ordered by the Judge and they will return to court for sentencing on January 16, 2023.
During the trial, the court heard that Manohar had threatened revenge after his brother was killed in Suriname. According to testimonies given in court, Manohar had ordered Persaud and others to ransom the boat which led to the killings. One of the surviving men of the attack, Darandeo Persaud called ‘Archie Bai’ had relayed to the court that he along with others were working on fishing vessel, ‘Joshua 1418’ when the pirates attacked them. The pirates told them they came to kill, he said. The survivor identified ‘Sanbad’ in court as one of the pirates that chopped him, and tied him to an anchor and subsequently threw him overboard.
“The first chop wah them chop, dem put me inside the fish pen to sit down and after that them tek me out and tie pon the anchor and throw me overboard,” he told the court.
Another riveting testimony came from Navin Balkissoon, he testified that he was acquainted with Monohar’s brother and knew him as ‘Paddy’ in Suriname. He said he attended the funeral service of ‘Paddy’ and that he was standing with Manohar at the pyre, when ‘Fyah’ uttered that the pyre for those that killed his brother will have to be lit.
Nakool Manohar called Fyah
Balkissoon said that ‘Sanbad’ was also at the funeral and said that he called his Sister and told her what ‘Fyah’ had said at the funeral to him, but that he did not want to be part of what ‘Fyah’ had planned. Sometime after, he saw ‘Fyah’ and ‘Sanbad’ on the wharf where the crew was picked out to execute the attack and instructions were given to them. He was approached by ‘Fyah’ on the wharf and told that if he was not a part of the crew, he will be killed but according to Balkissoon he got away and returned to Guyana.
Also testifying was Captain Deonarine Goberdhan, who told the court that the pirates approached their boat in a fishing vessel. He detailed that Tilaknauth Mohabir called ‘Kaiman’ was a part of his fishing crew and that he was the first to see the incoming vessel. He said the men asked whose boat it was and when he was pointed out as the captain, the men who were armed with guns and other weapons, demanded that they go into the fish pen. Goberdhan relayed that ‘Sanbad’, whom he knew for a few years prior to the attack, was sitting on the icebox and laughing. Goberdhan also demonstrated in the witness box how they were put to kneel by the men who attacked them and said that they were beaten and chopped with cutlasses. “Sanbad sit down pon the ice box and a laugh and I say ‘bai wah really going on budday?’ and he say ‘shut you (expletive) mouth’…” While he pleaded with the men to spare their lives and take everything else, those pleas went unheard. They all jumped overboard, he said, and he kept his head underwater for as long as he could so that the men could not spot him. He was rescued the following day by a boat. Several others testified in court and the Jury was not shy with their line of questioning. The accused men were represented by Attorney-at-Law, Mursaline Bhaccus , while the State was represented by Attorneys-at-Law Nafeeza Baig and Latchmie Rahamat.
Similar Articles
THE BLUNT OF THE DAY
Sports
Features/Columnists
This must not be our hour of humiliation
Peeping Tom… Kaieteur News- There are moments in the history of nations when fate lays before them a choice not of... more
The U.S. “Joining” the Commonwealth: an unreasonable expectation
By Sir Ronald Sanders Kaieteur News- Recent media stories have suggested that King Charles III could “invite” the United... more
Weekend Cartoon
