U.S. government to jury in 1MDB trial: Convict even if you don’t believe our star witness.

During six days of a grueling cross-examination he admitted to lying a lot in life. He was forced to admit to initially lying to federal agents, to his fellow partners at Goldman and to his wives and girlfriends.

But Ms. Smith said Mr. Leissner did not lie when he testified in federal court in Brooklyn to the key facts of the scheme, which was funded by a series of bond offerings that Goldman arranged for the 1MDB fund.

When it was time for Mr. Ng’s lawyer to present his closing arguments, he did not waste time calling out Mr. Leissner. The lawyer, Marc Agnifilo, said Mr. Leissner was a man who “will lie if it suits his interest.” He said that, despite what the prosecution had said, without Mr. Leissner’s testimony the government could not connect Mr. Ng to the conspiracy to steal billions from the 1MDB fund.

“There is no evidence that connects Roger,” Mr. Agnifilo said. “There is not a dirty email. Not a bad text message.”

By contrast, Mr. Agnifilo said, the jury had seen text messages in which Mr. Leissner was instructed on whom to pay bribe money to by Jho Low, a flamboyant Malaysian businessman who was the architect of the scheme and is a fugitive believed to be living in China.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/04/business/1mdb-trial-roger-ng.html