Six charged with escape of ‘Smallie’ granted $750,000 bail each

Close to a month after they were remanded to prison after being charged with aiding the now dead death row inmate, Mark Royden Williams with escaping from the Mazaruni Prison, a Superintendent of Prisons and five others were granted bail in the sum of $750,000 each.

The accused are Rajmohan Autor called ‘Chico’, 48, a businessman of Parika, East Bank Essequibo (EBE); Frangeliz Jugandry Flores Perez, 28, a Venezuelan national of Kitty, Georgetown; Omar Witherspoon, 26 of Stanleytown, New Amsterdam, Berbice; Conroy Hosannah, 35 of East Canje, Berbice; Oldfield Romulus, 50, of Victoria Cumberland Village, East Canje, Berbice and Alexander Hopkinson, 59 of Bartica Housing Scheme.

Bail was granted when they made their second court appearance on Thursday at the Bartica Magistrate’s Court.

Hopkinson is the Superintendent of Prisons at the Mazaruni Prison while Romulus is the second-in-charge.

Williams, called ‘Smallie’, in a daring daylight ordeal and assisted by men with high-powered weapons in a speedboat, escaped from the Mazaruni Prison on May 19.

The convicted mass murderer escaped while being escorted back from a visit. The escort party was fired upon with AK-47 automatic rifles by men inside the boat alongside the Mazaruni River.

The boat and its occupants, including Williams, proceeded upstream, past Itaballi landing, while Prison guards and Police in support undertook pursuit.

Days after, the accused were charged with conspiracy to commit a felony, contrary to section 34 of the Criminal Law (Offences) Act, Chapter 8:01. They all denied the allegation.

Williams is now dead. He was shot and killed by law enforcement officials on June 1.

Williams was convicted of murders stemming from the Bartica massacre in 2008, when he, along with other gunmen, ambushed and killed twelve (12) persons, including three (3) policemen. Additionally, he had been sentenced to death in September last year over the killing on January 23rd, 2008, of Guyana Defence Force member Corporal Ivor Williams.

He had previously escaped from the Camp Street Prison on July 09, 2017, but was recaptured on October 10, 2017, on the Weldaad Public Road, West Coast Berbice.