KUALA LUMPUR: The charges against Datuk Seri Najib Razak are valid and legally correct, the High Court says.
Judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah, reading out his decision in the trial against RM2.28bil 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB), said the defense team claims Najib’s allegations were “flawed, ambiguous and ambiguous”.
“I am of the opinion that the charges meet all legal criteria of the Code of Criminal Procedure,” the judge said here on Wednesday (October 30).
He also said he did not think Najib had been “misled” by the allegations.
According to the amended indictment, the former Pekan MP faces four charges of using his position to obtain a settlement of RM2.28 billion from 1MDB’s funds and 21 charges of money laundering involving the same amount .
The abuse of power offenses are alleged to have been committed between February 24, 2011 and December 19, 2014 at a branch of AmIslamic Bank Bhd, Jalan Raja Chulan, Bukit Ceylon.r
Meanwhile, the money laundering crimes are said to have been committed at the same location between March 22 and August 30, 2013.
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The charges were brought under Section 23(1) of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) Act 2009 and are punishable under Section 24(1) of the same act.
If convicted at the end of the defense case, Najib faces a prison term of up to 20 years and a fine of five times the amount of the gratuity or RM10,000, whichever is higher.
On May 30, the prosecutor closed his case after calling fifty witnesses to testify against the former prime minister.
Some of the high-profile witnesses included former 1MDB chairman Tan Sri Mohd Bakke Salleh, former 1MDB CEO Datuk Shahrol Azral Ibrahim Halmi and former Bank Negara governor Tan Sri Dr. Zeti Akhtar Aziz.
Another notable witness was former 1MDB general counsel Jasmine Loo, who spent about five years in hiding abroad before surrendering to authorities in July last year.
She became the 50th and last witness to testify.
READ ALSO: Najib’s fate is known today
The trial against the accuser started on August 28, 2019 and lasted 235 days.
The late deputy public prosecutor Datuk Seri Gopal Sri Ram led the prosecution team until his death in January last year.
Deputy Public Prosecutor Ahmad Akram Gharib took up his mantle along with other DPPs Mohamad Mustaffa P. Kunyalam and Kamal Bahrin Omar in the team.
Meanwhile, lead lawyer Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah and lawyers Wan Mohammad Arfan represented Wan Othman, Alaistair Brandah Norman and Wan Azwan Aiman Wan Fakhruddin Najib.
There’s more to come