A murder accused was earlier today granted $750, 000 bail following a successful application by his attorney in the High Court.
Asdino Bowen was on remand at the Mazaruni Prison for the 2015 murder of Linden resident, Shevon Gordon.
According to his attorney, Dexter Todd, upon completion of his preliminary inquiry in May 2017, he was committed to stand trial for murder in the High Court of Demerara at the next available sitting.
The Preliminary Inquiry was reopened in April of 2019 and he was again committed to stand trial for murder in 2020.
Todd said despite being committed to stand trial for murder since 2020, his name has never appeared on the Criminal Assizes Session. As such, an Application was made on December 16, 2022, to the High Court for bail pending his murder trial.
Murder accused: Asdino Bowen
Dead: Shevon Gordon
Todd said that the State in their defense of the Application indicated that the Director of Public Prosecution had made a second request for a reopening of the Preliminary Inquiry but there was no indication on any document of whether that was done. While the State did indicate in their defense that the presiding Magistrate at the time confirmed that he did reopen the preliminary inquiry for the second time, there was no evidence to prove the same. The State highlighted that they were ‘awaiting word’ on the reopening of the Preliminary Inquiry as well as depositions from said reopening.
High Court Judge, Simone Morris-Ramlall during the first hearing of the Application did not accept that answer from the State and while she did not grant Mr. Bowen bail on that occasion, she instructed the prosecutors in the matter to get all the necessary information needed and file a supplementary Affidavit in Defense highlighting why Mr. Bowen’s name was never on the Criminal Assizes Session and all the relevant information as to his various Preliminary Inquiries, the attorney explained.
In their Supplementary Affidavit in Defense, the prosecution indicated that the Clerk of Court Perused Bowen’s file and found that the second Preliminary Inquiry was opened in June 2021 and that the file was uplifted on January 4, 2023, to compile the depositions of the Preliminary Inquiry. This highlighted that Bowen was never indicated for murder, a very important aspect of the process.
Todd said that the judge agreed with his position that his client’s constitutional rights were infringed by this delay and therefore granted bail along with the condition that he must report to the police every Friday until his trial for murder in the High Court is completed.
According to Todd, this is perhaps the second time in the history of Guyana that an accused person was granted bail for murder.