PUTRAJAYA — Former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak was found guilty by the High Court today of four counts of abuse of power and 21 counts of money laundering involving nearly RM2.2 billion in the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) case.
Justice Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah, the Federal Court judge who previously presided over the 1MDB trial at the High Court, delivered his judgment to a packed courtroom after finding that the prosecution had proven its case beyond reasonable doubt.
Najib’s conviction comes after the court delivered a lengthy judgment, taking nearly four and a half hours to read, following a High Court trial that lasted over 300 days across more than six years.
Under the four charges of abuse of power, Najib is accused of using his three positions — as prime minister, finance minister and chairman of 1MDB’s board of advisers — to obtain financial benefits totalling RM2.22 billion for himself.
Sequerah also convicted Najib on 21 counts related to the alleged laundering of illicit funds through the latter’s personal AmIslamic Bank account.
In delivering his verdict, Sequerah ruled that Najib’s Arab donation defence — a key argument throughout the trial — lacked merit, and that the donation letters purportedly from Saudi royalty submitted as evidence were forged.
“The evidence, when viewed as a whole, showed that there is no credible, contemporaneous or reliable documentary evidence that directly connects the large sums deposited into the accused’s personal accounts to King Abdullah or any member of the Saudi royal family.
“The ultimate finding of this court, therefore, and the irresistible conclusion is that the Arab donation narrative is not meritorious, donation letters were forgeries, and that the evidence pointed unmistakably to the fact that the monies were in fact derived from 1MDB funds,” the judge said.
Following the convictions, the court moved to mitigation and sentencing, with the 72-year-old former prime minister facing both imprisonment and substantial fines.
Regardless of the outcome, the decision will not affect Najib’s current imprisonment.
This is because he is currently serving a jail sentence in a separate case involving the misappropriation of RM42 million from SRC International Sdn Bhd.
Najib is now about halfway through his six-year jail term, which will end in August 2028 or August 2029, depending on whether he pays the RM50 million fine imposed in the SRC case.
Despite the High Court’s decision, the ruling can still be appealed to the Court of Appeal and subsequently, to the Federal Court.
As such, today’s ruling will likely not mark the end of the 1MDB case.
