As AG stays silent, Rosmah presses on with bid to strike out money laundering and tax evasion charges

KUALA LUMPUR, July 4 — Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor's money laundering and tax evasion trial proceeded today despite the lack of reply from the Attorney General’s Chambers to her representation for the charges to be dismissed.

At the onset of today's hearing, Rosmah’s lawyer Amer Hamzah Arshad informed High Court Judge K. Muniandy that the defence consequently wished to proceed with its application to strike out all the 17 charges against her.

“There is no answer as of today (on the representation). We do not wish to delay the matter. We will proceed with the submission (to strike out the charges),” he said.

This is the third representation sent by the wife of former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, and was made in December last year.

The first and second representations were submitted on May 3 and August 18, 2023 respectively, but have also not been decided by the AGC yet.

On the application for dismissal, Amer argued the charges against his client lacked sufficient detail to be valid.

“The charges need to disclose key elements of the offence and one of the key elements is the element of transaction.

“The way how they are framed, they did not disclose an offence recognised in law,” he said, referring to the charges.

Muniandy later adjourned the hearing to August 23 to allow another of Rosmah's lawyer Datuk Firoz Hussein Ahmad Jamaluddin to submit further following sick leave absence from court today.

This is Rosmah's second corruption trial.

On September 1, 2022, Court of Appeal judge Mohamed Zaini Mazlan ― then a High Court judge ― found Rosmah guilty of three corruption charges involving RM1.25 billion in connection with a hybrid solar project to provide electricity for 369 rural schools in Sarawak.

She was also fined RM970 million, in default of 30 years in jail, but her sentence is on hold pending an appeal to the Court of Appeal.

In this trial, Rosmah is facing 12 money laundering charges involving RM7,097,750, and five counts of failure to declare her income to the Inland Revenue Board between December 4, 2013, to June 8, 2017.