Roger Khan deemed flight risk --denied bail
Guyana Chronicle
December 7, 2006
THE odds did not favour Guyanese controversial businessman Shaheed `Roger’ Khan, also known as `Short Man’, and his defence team, attorneys Robert Simmels and Miami-based John Bergendahl yesterday in their bid to secure bail for him.
In another appearance before Justice Dora Lizzette Irririzary, at the U.S. Eastern District Court on Tillary Street in downtown Brooklyn, at the end of a 45-day adjournment requested by the prosecution, reports out of New York said the defence fought an uphill battle to secure bail for Khan, as well as an adjournment on the detention hearing.
The judge was prepared to proceed with the detention hearing.
In the end she remained steadfast in denying bail, deeming Khan a flight risk, and reluctantly postponed the detention hearing to January 4, 2007 at 10:00 h.
According to the reports, Judge Irririzary was all prepared to proceed to hear arguments in relation to the alleged illegal detention of Khan as set out by his attorneys, but they were not and continuously requested to have Gary Tuggle, a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent of the U.S. and others as witnesses during the hearing.
But according to the judge, she did not see their presence as relevant saying what was important was that Khan who had absconded from trial in the U.S. for some 12 years is there in person.
The defence, however, continued to make reference to Khan’s ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) detention and through Simmels suggested to the judge that the hearing should have been conducted by a magistrate and not her.
Judge Irririzary countered by responding “I represent the government and I will handle all the matters.”
At one point too, an evidently annoyed Judge Irririzary remarked to the defence “you want a mini trial…you are going on a fishing expedition…I am ready to proceed today on the detention hearing.”
Simmels later told reporters it seems as if the judge is endorsing the government rather than being concerned about the case.
He contended too, that the only evidence which the prosecution has to date against Khan is what refers to him as a “drug dealer” and that the prosecution which earlier said it has evidence against him from Guyana, claims it is seeking to garner more at that end as well as from Suriname.
On denying the defence request for bail, the judge in deeming Khan a flight risk, pointed out that he had absconded from trial in Vermont, Maryland and was wanted in Guyana when he escaped to Suriname where he was captured.
In addition, she said, he is not a U.S. citizen, the close ties he has there are all scattered in the U.S. and his family has the means (finances) to assist him to take flight.
“Who is to question that he is not a flight risk?” she queried.
Khan’s brother Rafeek, according to the defence, is the elder of the family and would have ensured that his brother remain in the U.S., but he was not in court yesterday because he was attending to pressing matters, the lawyers said.
But Judge Irririzary asked what pressing matters could have been more than that related to his brother.
Khan, who has started to grow his trademark beard, was reportedly quite relaxed during his appearance, dressed in his orange prison jumpsuit.
Khan is on remand on an indictment by a New York Grand Jury in May this year for conspiracy to import cocaine to the U.S.
The warrant, which carried the Case Number 06CR 255, “commanded” the United States Marshall and/or any authorised United States Officer, “to arrest Shaheed Khan, also known as `Roger Khan' and `Short Man’ and bring him forthwith to the nearest magistrate to answer an indictment charging him with conspiring to import cocaine into the United States.”
The warrant, signed by Justice Roanne Mann on April 13, 2006, stated that the alleged offence was in violation of Title 21, U.S. Case section 963.
Khan was nabbed in Trinidad and whisked to the U.S. after being expelled from neighbouring Suriname on June 29 last where authorities there had arrested him and 11 others, including three other Guyanese - Paul Rodrigues, Sean Belfield and Lloyd Robert – said to be his bodyguards.
The arrest was made during an alleged huge drug bust on June 15, 2006 in Paramaribo, Suriname, when Police in the former Dutch colony said they netted 213 kilos of cocaine.
Khan was deported without being charged and his deportation facilitated his subsequent apprehension by U.S. law enforcement officials in Trinidad which took place as soon as he left the Suriname Airways flight.
Recently, in Trinidad and Tobago, Khan's lawyers were successful in securing the ruling by a High Court Judge to permit a judicial review of the proceedings that had resulted in their client's removal, against his will, from that country to the U.S.
The ruling allowed Khan to "challenge and impugn" the decisions of two officials of the Trinidad and Tobago government, namely immigration officer Stephen Sookram, and lawyer David West of the Attorney General's office, who were identified by his lawyers as having been involved in the controversial arrangements to have him flown to the U.S.
And, in a surprising intervention, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Geoffrey Henderson, last week sought to have the charges brought against Sookram and Best withdrawn.
Khan's lawyers are reportedly in the process of applying to the Trinidad and Tobago High Court for a review of the DPP's action to determine whether his "discretion" in the matter involving their client, was "properly exercised".
Meanwhile, after serving just more than five months under harsh conditions in separate jails in Suriname, without being charged, Belfield, Roberts and Rodrigues, were deported from Suriname on November 22 last.
They, unlike their boss, were brought across the border Corentyne River and whisked overland under heavy guard to Police headquarters where they remained in custody before being charged for illegal departure and taken to court on November 27, last.
This occurred after Justice B.S. Roy acting on an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by attorney Glenn Hanoman on behalf of the three men had ordered the Guyana Police to immediately release them.
On a subsequent court appearance on December 1, the three pleaded guilty to leaving Guyana illegally and were each fined $20,000.