Acting Chief Magistrate Melissa Robertson yesterday remanded to prison a 26-year-old woman who allegedly presented forged cheques to Republic Bank and Demerara Bank and obtained a total of $495,000.

Semone Etwaru of Lot 44 Providence, East Bank Demerara, was not required to plead to eight indictable counts of obtaining money by a forged instrument, when they were read to her at the Georgetown Magistrate’s Court.

It is alleged that between September 19 and 29 last year, Etwaru with intent to defraud, obtained $150,000 from Republic Bank by presenting forged cheques purporting to show that they had been issued by Ramchand Netram.

It is also alleged that between August 11 and September 30 last year, Etwaru, with intent to defraud, obtained $345,000 from Demerara Bank by presenting cheques purporting to show that they had been issued by Netram.

However, Etwaru’s lawyer Paul Fung-a-Fat stated that she was employed by Netram and Sons General Store last year from August to Decem-ber as a secretary.

He said Etwaru had offered to settle out of court by recompensing Netram with $520,000, but Netram had refused to accept it.

He said his client had been in police custody for five days and the matter had been under investigation for over four months.

He said that there was never any “intent to defraud” in these cases since his client had not collected any of the money that she was accused of collecting. Fung-a-Fat said the money was collected by a “Marlyn Seenarine” and that at no time was his client’s signature on the cheques. He said all of the cheques were signed by Netram.

Fung-a-Fat said further that the investigating officer in the matter had ordered his client to sign Netram’s name on a paper while she was at the police station and all of her attempts showed that she did not forge Netram’s signature on the cheques.

He claimed that his client had received death threats and had then gone into hiding at her mother’s home in Providence, East Bank Demerara.

The defence attorney also said that last Thursday as his client was on her way to a job interview, Netram disembarked his bus and “dragged her bodily to the station”. The lawyer then applied for bail.

But Police Prosecutor Denise Griffith asked that the bail application be refused on the grounds that Etwaru may not return to court.

She said there were additional charges to be brought against Etwaru.

Griffith said that shortly after the fraud was detected, Etwaru had disappeared. She said also that Netram never dragged Etwaru to the police station; the police arrested her and took her there.

The magistrate subsequently ordered that Etwaru be remanded to prison and that she appear back in court on April 14.