Acting Chief Magistrate Melissa Robertson granted bail to two men who allegedly robbed the son of Minister Shaik Baksh of an iPod while he was exercising at Bagotstown.

Rondel Williams, 20, of 83 Leopold Street and Christoff Braithwaite, 19, of 19 George Street, Werk-en-Rust both pleaded not guilty to the charge of robbery with violence.

It is alleged that on January 18, Williams and Braithwaite robbed Kamrul Baksh of an iPod valued $50,000 and used violence to commit the act.

However, Williams’s lawyer, Adrian Thompson applied for bail for him on the grounds that the iPod was recovered. He stated that from information gathered, it was a gang of boys riding on bicycles who carried out the robbery and because his client was in the area at the time the police arrested him.

Brathwaite’s lawyer also applied for bail for him on the grounds that he had no previous convictions  and if granted bail his client would return to court.

However, Prosecutor Sherwin Matthews said a gang was never involved in the robbery. He said that on the day in question Baksh was on the “seawalls” at Bagotstown, East Bank Demerara  exercising when Williams and Braithwaite approached him and violently robbed him of the iPod. He noted that the iPod was found in Braithwaite’s possession and Williams was implicated in the matter since the two of them were together on the day of the robbery.

Matthews then asked that Braithwaite’s bail application be refused since he had allegedly told the police that he lived in Henry Street and because Braithwaite’s father had also been before the court charged with similar offences.

Matthews asserted that “the person must be of reputable character if he is to stand as a surety that the accused would return to court” but in this case that isn’t so since “the son ain’t far from his father.”

Thompson then stated that “the prosecution has no relevant grounds” to object to his client’s bail application since the offence was a bailable one and any one of Braithwaite’s  family members could have stood as a surety that he  would return to court if granted bail.

The magistrate subsequently placed both Williams and Braithwaite on bail in the sum of $75,000 each and ordered that they appear again in court on February 12.