Report: Judge recuses self from 1MDB’s lawsuit against Jho Low and family as case filed by his previous law firm

KUALA LUMPUR, May 21 — A High Court judge today recused himself from hearing 1Malaysia Development Berhad’s (1MDB) lawsuit against fugitive Low Taek Jho, two of his family members, and his associate, a report said.

According to financial news outlet The Edge, the High Court in Kuala Lumpur’s judicial commissioner Quay Chew Soon had in a case management of 1MDB’s lawsuit declined to be the judge hearing the case assigned to him as the lawsuit was filed by his former firm.

Quay had been a partner at the law firm Skrine, prior to his appointment as a judicial commissioner on November 28, 2019.

The Edge reported Skrine partner Siva Kumar Kanagasabai as confirming the updates from the case management.

This was the first time that this lawsuit came up for case management since it was filed earlier this month, Malay Mail’s check of the court’s online filing system showed.

Checks of the court’s online filing system also showed that the case is to be transferred to another High Court judge handling civil lawsuits, and that the next case management for this lawsuit will be on June 10 before deputy registrar Nor Afidah Idris.

In this lawsuit, 1MDB is seeking US$1.03 billion from Low, US$328 million from his father Tan Sri Larry Low Hock Peng, US$3.5 million from his sister Low May Lin, and US$41 million from his associate Eric Tan Kim Loong, with the company having alleged the four of being involved in “fraudulent concealment, fraudulent misappropriation of funds, unjust enrichment, breach of trust and conspiracy”, The Edge reported.

This lawsuit is one of the six lawsuits that 1MDB had filed on May 7.

On May 10, the Finance Ministry confirmed that 1MDB has filed six lawsuits against a total of nine entities and 25 individuals for various alleged wrongdoings and that 1MDB’s former subsidiary SRC International Sdn Bhd had filed 16 lawsuits against a total of eight entities and 15 individuals for various alleged wrongdoings.

The ministry said the 22 lawsuits filed by 1MDB and SRC on May 7 were to seek for the recovery of assets totalling more than RM96.6 billion (US$23 billion), adding that the two companies claim that the entities and individuals sued had allegedly been unjustly enriched by wrongfully receiving monies from the two companies.

Besides 1MDB’s lawsuit involving Low, his two family members, there were two other lawsuits from the 22 cases that came up for their first case management today.

These two lawsuits are 1MDB’s lawsuit seeking to claim US$1 billion and legal fees of RM664,821.21 from law firm Wong & Partners and its partner Brian Chia, and SRC’s lawsuit — involving US$1.15 billion or RM4 billion of losses — against former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, former 1MDB CEO Datuk Shahrol Azral Ibrahim Halmi, former SRC directors Datuk Mohammed Azhar Osman Khairuddin, Datuk Che Abdullah @ Rashidi Che Omar, Nik Faisal Ariff Kamil, Datuk Suboh Md Yassin, Tan Sri Ismee Ismail, The Edge said.

According to The Edge in a separate report and from Malay Mail’s checks, these two lawsuits came up for case management today for the first time, with the matters heard before deputy registrar Siti Aisyah Ahmad.

Following today’s case management of the two lawsuits in the Commercial High Court in Kuala Lumpur, the next case management for both cases will be before High Court judicial commissioner Liza Chan Sow Keng on June 1.