51�Թ���

NEW YORK, NY – MAY 03, 2021: Since the age of 15 Prakash Churaman, a Guyanese Immigrant, now a 21-year-old, has been behind bars on a felony murder conviction and returns for a second trial after his conviction was overturned at Queens County Criminal Court before the same Queens prosecutor-turned-judge who put him in prison on May 3, 2021. He has been offered from Queen’s prosecutors a plead guilty to a lesser charge and walk away a free man in the summer of 2021 an offer Churaman has turned down and was quoted as saying: “I’m not taking it because I’m innocent,” during a phone interview with THE CITY from Rikers Island. Churaman’s case has been in the court system since Dec. 9, 2014. The authorities contend he was one the three masked gunmen who broke into a home in Jamaica, Queens where a 21-year-old resident Taquane Clark was fatally shot and a second person was wounded. No DNA linking him to the scene was ever found. Churaman returns for a second trial with his current defense lawyer, Jose Nieves. Activists and supporters stand outside the courthouse holding signs that read: ”We Demand D.A Melinda Katz Drop All Charges Against Prakash!” (Footage by Tomas Abad/Getty Images)