A US appeals court has ordered that Guyanese murder accused Marcus Bisram be extradited to Guyana, after denying both a rehearing of his appeal arguments and a motion to stay the extradition.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit last week issued a mandate that Bisram be extradited to Guyana, rebuffing a petition for a rehearing for his appeal arguments and a motion to stay the mandate.
Bisram, a dual citizen of the United States of America and Guyana, currently faces a charge of murder in Guyana for an incident which occurred on the night of October 31st, 2016. He is accused of ordering the fatal beating of Faiyaz Narinedatt, a young father of two.
In July, he lost his appeal to an order which was made by a district court in New York to extradite him to Guyana. However, his attorneys then filed a petition to have their arguments reheard. However, the appeal for rehearing was denied late last month. Bisram’s attorneys, on his behalf, then filed a motion to stay the mandate for the extradition and this was denied last week.
It is likely that Bisram will be extradited to Guyana soon as he is seemingly running out of appeal tactics. A source close to the case yesterday told Stabroek News that the commencement of the extradition process now sits with the Secretary of State.
On February 14, 2017, following an investigation into Narinedatt’s death, Guyana submitted a formal request to the United States Department of State for Bisram’s extradition to face a charge of murder, after the accused had fled overseas. On October 12, 2017, a magistrate judge in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York issued a Certificate of Extraditability, certifying to the Secretary of State that there was probable cause to believe that Bisram committed the charged murder and authorising the Secretary’s extradition of Bisram to Guyana.
On November 17, 2017, Bisram filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus challenging the Certificate of Extraditability.
On October 31, 2018, following several extensions, the district court denied Bisram’s petition, concurring in the magistrate judge’s determination that there was “reasonable ground” to believe that Bisram committed the murder as charged. Bisram, through his attorneys, subsequently appealed the district court’s denial of his habeas petition on the grounds that the evidence presented to the extradition court failed to establish a reasonable ground to believe that Bisram committed the charged murder, especially in light of a witness’s subsequent alleged recantation of his original statement to police and that Bisram received constitutionally ineffective assistance of counsel during the extradition and habeas proceedings.
However, in July, the United States Court of Appeal for the Second Circuit affirmed the judgement of the district court, clearing the way for Bisram to be extradited to Guyana.