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KUALA LUMPUR – The government has failed in its bid to forfeit luxury goods seized by the authorities from Pavilion Residences here in a 2018 raid.
Justice Muhammad Jamil Hussin said the Attorney-General’s Chambers (AGC) has failed to demonstrate how 2,435 pieces of jewellery, seven watches and 29 handbags were linked to the 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) financial scandal.
Deputy public prosecutor Faten Hadni Khairuddin said the government will be appealing the Kuala Lumpur High Court’s decision and applied to not return the items pending the appeal.
However, the court has rejected her request to keep the items.
“There is no need for the court to make a ruling on the third-party claimants (former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and wife Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor),” Jamil was quoted as saying by Free Malaysia Today.
In 2019, the prosecution filed a forfeiture application against Obyu Holdings Sdn Bhd, which is identified as the owner of two condominium units in Pavillion Residences where the items were seized from.
The seized items were 11,991 units of jewellery, 401 watch straps and 16 watch accessories, 234 pairs of spectacles, and 306 handbags, as well as cash in various denominations amounting to RM114,164,393.44.
The total items seized were valued between RM900 million and RM1.1 billion.
Rosmah, Najib and several family members had filed a claim on the forfeited assets.
In August last year, the RM114 million in cash was returned to Najib, who said he kept the money on behalf of Umno. This was not appealed by the prosecution.
Similarly, in November of the same year, high court judge Mohamed Zaini Mazlan ordered the remaining items to be returned to Najib, Rosmah and other family members after the dismissal of the government’s forfeiture suit.
In July, the government failed in the application to stay the return of the items.
Among the items seized in May 2018 was a US$220,000 (RM966,750) white-gold diamond bracelet, which was initially claimed by Rosmah and Lebanese company Global Royalty Trading SAL.
However, on June 8, Rosmah relinquished her claim, and the bracelet is now being kept in Bank Negara Malaysia’s vaults.
Najib has filed claims on the remaining seven watches.
On September 1, Rosmah was sentenced to 10 years in jail and a historic RM970 million fine – an amount her defence lawyers labelled as unprecedented eclipsing the RM210 million fine imposed on Najib in the SRC International corruption case. – The Vibes, November 14, 2022