The couple, who had been recently charged with a string of visa scams, was yesterday granted $1M bail each when they appeared before Acting Chief Magistrate Melissa Robertson at the Georgetown Magistrate’s Court.

Tulsie Persaud, 30, of Lot 4 Cemetery Road, Triumph Village, East Coast Dem-erara, and Simone King, 29, of Phase Two Good Hope, ECD, had been jointly charged with obtaining $4.9M from several persons by pretending that they were in the position to obtain genuine US visas for them.

Their lawyer Karvern Kyte Williams had applied for bail for them on the grounds that they were not aware of any visa transactions but had entered into a valid business relationship with the Virtual Complainants (VC).

Meanwhile, Prosecutor Stephen Telford had told the court that on their last court appearance both defendants had agreed to recompense all the VCs and had even asked for more time to accumulate the monies.

Attorney-at-law Nigel Hughes, who was also present in court to represent the defendants, stated that the restitution from his clients to the VCs had been impaired since they were incarcerated.

Telford then objected to the bail applications on the grounds that the charges are of a similar nature involving different defendants, that investigations are currently ongoing in relation to other offences of a similar nature that may have been committed by Persaud and that if released both defendants may flee the jurisdiction.

Hughes then stated that those grounds were not valid in making an objection to the bail applications and noted that the investigation into the matter was three weeks old which showed that the police were not undertaking it expeditiously.

He also noted that the prosecutor had presented no information to the court that would support their statements that his clients would flee if released.

Williams then informed the court that the defendants’ passports are currently lodged at the police station.

The magistrate then ordered that the matter be transferred to Court Three for February 16.