NEW YORK (BLOOMBERG): The jury within the 1MDB conspiracy case in opposition to former Goldman Sachs banker Roger Ng has requested to review testimony from his spouse that the defence says is vital to its case.
After seven weeks of testimony in federal court docket in Brooklyn, New York, the jurors deciding the destiny of Goldman Sachs Group Inc’s former head of funding banking in Malaysia made the request quickly after they started their deliberations on Tuesday (April 5) afternoon.
Ng’s spouse, Lim Hwee Bin, testified final week on his behalf {that a} US$35.1mil (RM148mil) infusion of capital right into a shell firm she managed wasn’t a kickback for her husband within the 1MDB scheme, however was from an unrelated, authentic enterprise transaction.
Ng is accused of conspiring to violate United States anti-bribery legal guidelines and launder cash in a plot to steal billions of {dollars} from the sovereign wealth fund 1Malaysia Development Bhd.
Ng is the one Goldman Sachs Group Inc banker to go to trial in a case that noticed the agency pay US$5bil (RM21bil) in penalties and its Malaysian unit plead responsible, one of many largest blows to Goldman in its historical past.
Prosecutors known as Ng a crucial participant in a bribe-paying and money-laundering scheme masterminded by Malaysian financier Low Taek Jho, higher referred to as Jho Low, during which US$2.7bil (RM11.4bil) was siphoned from the fund, 1Malaysia Development Bhd. Goldman organized bond offers for 1MDB.
The trial, which started with opening statements on Feb 14, featured Ng’s former boss, Tim Leissner, as the federal government’s star witness.
Leissner pleaded responsible and is cooperating with the US, for which he might win leniency at sentencing. Jho Low alone collected not less than US$1.42bil (RM6bil) from the fraud, whereas he allegedly paid Ng US$35.1mil (RM148mil) in kickbacks and Leissner acquired greater than US$60mil (RM253mil), in accordance to the US.
Ng, 49, faces as many as 30 years in jail if convicted on all counts.
Leissner, who was Goldman’s South-East Asia chairman, was the highest-ranking Goldman banker to plead responsible to the scheme to plunder 1MDB whereas Ng was the agency’s head of funding banking in Malaysia.
Low, who the United States says bribed authorities officers in Malaysia and Abu Dhabi to win the enterprise for Goldman – and a jackpot for himself – remains to be at giant. Former Malaysian prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak was convicted in Malaysia in 2020 on costs together with cash laundering and corruption and sentenced to 12 years in jail. He is interesting.
The jury went house at about 5pm Tuesday after requesting Lim’s testimony. The jurors will resume deliberations Wednesday (April 6) morning.
The case is US v. Low Taek Jho, 18-cr-538, US District Court, Eastern District of New York (Brooklyn). – Bloomberg
