Days after being granted bail on a charge of overstaying, a Cuban national found herself back behind bars yesterday after a city court was notified that a forged document was used to support her case for her release.
Yeney Batista Vilalba appeared before Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan on Monday and was read a charge which stated that she overstayed in the country. She had been granted permission to stay in Guyana for the one-month period of January 4th to February 4th of 2019.
In seeking bail for Vilalba, her attorney had told the court that she had applied for an extension of her stay.
At a hearing yesterday, Police Prosecutor Gordon Mansfield informed the court that checks were made at the Ministry of Citizenship to ascertain if the supporting document, purported to have been issued by the Ministry of Citizenship, was authentic. The prosecutor noted that according to a statement submitted by Claudette Bromes, a supervisor at the ministry, the document presented to the court was discovered to be fake.
The prosecutor added that further charges are likely to be laid against the defendant. Mansfield then requested that the defendant’s bail, set at $20,000, be revoked.
This request was later granted.
During Vilalba’s first court appearance, she told the court that she was only visiting Guyana, although she was residing at a Bourda address with her Guyanese boyfriend.
