Kuala Lumpur: A witness said that fugitive financier Low Taek Jho, or Jho Low, and Najib Razak’s stepson, Riza Aziz, were good friends based on observations she made during a ski trip to Canada.
Former 1MDB general counsel Jasmine Loo told the High Court today she first met Riza together with Low and his family in Whistler, Canada, at the end of December 2012 or early January 2013.
In her witness statement, Loo, 51, said she joined 1MDB in May 2011 and left in November 2013.
“After I left 1MDB, I met and became acquainted with him (Riza) on other occasions when I travelled with Low,” she said, adding that they remained merely acquaintances.
She was testifying in a suit brought by 1MDB and its subsidiaries – 1MDB Energy Holdings Ltd, 1MDB Energy Ltd and 1MDB Energy (Langat) Ltd – against Riza for misappropriating funds amounting to US$148 million.
The suit also names Red Granite Pictures Incorporated (RGP) and Red Granite Capital Ltd (RGC) as defendants.
Cross-examined by lawyer Wan Azwan Aiman Wan Fakhruddin, representing the defendants, Loo said that, based on her observations during the ski trip, Riza and Low appeared to be close friends.
Wan Azwan: Does that also make you a good friend of Low?
Loo: I am not denying that.
Loo confirmed that she was charged under the Capital Markets and
Services Act in 2018, but said the authorities were still investigating the case.
“I was charged in absentia,” said Loo, who returned home last year.
At this juncture, 1MDB’s counsel, Rabindra Nathan, objected to the line of questioning as it had no relevance to this case.
However, counsel Shafee Abdullah, also representing the defendants, said Loo had incriminated herself when she testified in Najib’s on-going 1MDB criminal trial.
“She is still acting in cahoots with Low. It was revealed in the criminal trial that Low smuggled her into Myanmar and she later met him in China,” he said.
Judicial commissioner Raja Ahmad Mohzanuddin Shah Raja Mohzan allowed the defence counsel to continue with their line of questioning.
Loo said she was not aware of the transfer of US$10 million in 1MDB funds to RGP or another remittance of US$138 million to RGC, both entities linked to Riza.
In its opening statement, 1MDB said the funds had been siphoned out of 1MDB through two companies linked to Low.
The plaintiffs claim the monies were misappropriated for gambling activities, to fund movies produced by RGP, and to purchase real estate and movie memorabilia.
1MDB claims that between 2011 and 2012, US$10 million was siphoned out to the defendants via Good Star, a company owned by Low, through various intermediate steps.
1MDB had raised US$1 billion in 2009, of which US$700 million went to Good Star in the belief that it was a subsidiary of 1MDB Petro Saudi Ltd, a joint venture company.
Good Star then paid US$10 million to a bank account belonging to RGP which had Riza as its signatory.
Another US$238 million was also siphoned out in 2012, when 1MDB engaged Goldman Sachs to arrange and underwrite two separate bonds amounting to US$3 billion raised to acquire certain energy assets.
The statement claimed that after 1MDB or its subsidiaries had received the proceeds from the bonds, Low caused the siphoning out of a substantial portion of the net proceeds of the bonds to a Swiss bank account belonging to an entity called Aabar Investments PJS Ltd.
It said Low set up an account at BSI Bank in Lugano, Switzerland, in the name of Aabar-BVI, a fictitious company, and arranged for the fraudulent transfer of around US$1.367 billion from 1MDB to Aabar-BVI.
The US$238 million was then sent to the defendants between June 18 and Nov 14, 2012.
1MDB claims that Riza, who controlled the two Red Granite companies, which produced the Hollywood hit “The Wolf of Wall Street”, knew or ought to have known that the funds had been misappropriated and used for their benefit or their associates.
The plaintiffs are seeking a declaration that the defendants are liable to account for the funds misappropriated from 1MDB.
Alternatively, the plaintiffs are seeking a repayment of the funds misappropriated from it based on unjust enrichment.
Outside court, Shafee said Riza would not testify in this trial, though he is the first defendant.
The trial will resume on Monday.
