Chief Magistrate Judy Latchman has rejected a fresh attempt by lawyers for Azruddin and Nazar Mohamed to halt extradition proceedings against the pair, ruling that her court remains bound by an existing order from the Guyana Court of Appeal. The decision means the case, which has already been delayed for months, will continue at the Georgetown Magistrates' Court even as a separate constitutional challenge remains unresolved before the appellate courts.

Azruddin Mohamed, who leads the opposition WIN party, and his father Nazar Mohamed are wanted in the United States on an eleven count indictment unsealed by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of Florida. The charges include wire fraud, mail fraud, money laundering and customs related offences connected to an alleged scheme to under-declare gold exports and evade more than fifty million US dollars in duties and taxes owed to the Guyanese state.

Lawyers for the Mohameds asked Latchman on Thursday to stay proceedings until they could obtain written clarification from the Court of Appeal on how a prior appellate ruling affects the current hearing. That ruling, issued after a constitutional challenge to sections of the Fugitive Offenders Act, permits the extradition hearing to continue but prevents the magistrate from delivering a final decision until the appeal is resolved. Latchman told the court that this order was clear on its face and gave her no discretion to pause the case further.

The request formed part of what prosecutors have described as a pattern of procedural challenges since the hearing opened in January. Proceedings have stalled repeatedly since then, most recently between late March and early September, amid a series of medical submissions, appeals and an interim stay granted earlier this year by the Caribbean Court of Justice. The CCJ lifted that stay this week, clearing the way for the Georgetown court to resume.

With the latest bid for delay refused, the prosecution, led by Special Prosecutor Terrence Williams KC, proceeded to call its second witness, Senior Superintendent Prem Narine, who heads the Guyana Police Force's Special Branch. Sharon Roopchand-Edwards, permanent secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, had also been made available for further cross examination, though the magistrate deferred that portion of the evidence after defence counsel argued it touched on matters connected to the pending appeal.

Defence counsel Roysdale Forde told the court that several elements of the case, including provisions drawn from the extradition treaty between Guyana, the United Kingdom and the United States, were bound up with arguments already before the Court of Appeal. He said a ruling on the appeal could affect the validity of testimony taken before it was decided, and indicated that the defence team would write formally to the appellate court seeking guidance on how its order should be applied to the ongoing hearing.

The extradition request stems from a US Treasury sanctions designation issued against Azruddin Mohamed, Nazar Mohamed and their business, Mohamed's Enterprise, in June 2024. American authorities allege the company omitted roughly ten thousand kilogrammes of gold from its export declarations between 2019 and 2023, relying in part on falsified customs paperwork and reused government export seals to disguise the shipments' true volume and value. Washington formally requested extradition on 30 October 2025, and Guyana's foreign affairs minister, Oneidge Walrond, subsequently issued the Authority to Proceed that opened committal proceedings before Latchman.

No date has yet been set for the resumption of Roopchand-Edwards's cross examination or for the next stage of witness testimony. The case is expected to continue amid further legal argument over how the pending Fugitive Offenders Act challenge intersects with the committal process, with both sides braced for the matter to run well beyond its original timetable.

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