Ex-Goldman Sachs Banker Roger Ng Convicted for Corruption Charges in 1MDB Case

Former Goldman Sachs banker Roger Ng was convicted by a U.S. jury on Friday of corruption charges related to his role in helping loot hundreds of millions of dollars from Malaysia's 1MDB development fund.

The charges stemmed from one of the biggest financial scandals in history. Prosecutors charged Ng, Goldman's former top investment banker for Malaysia, for conspiring to violate an anti-corruption law and launder money.

They said he helped his former boss Tim Leissner embezzle money from the fund, launder the proceeds and bribe officials to win business for Goldman.

Ng had pleaded not guilty to the charges. His lawyers say Leissner, who pleaded guilty to similar charges in 2018 and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors' investigation, falsely implicated Ng in the hopes of receiving a lenient sentence.

The fund was founded to pursue development projects in the Southeast Asian country.

The jury convicted Ng of two counts of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) through bribery and circumvention of Goldman's internal accounting controls, as well as one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering.

"Today's verdict is a victory for not only the rule of law, but also for the people of Malaysia," Breon Peace, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement. "The defendant and his cronies saw 1MDB not as an entity to do good for the people of Malaysia, but as a piggy bank to enrich themselves."

Deliberations began on Tuesday after a nearly two-month trial in federal court in Brooklyn.

Source: CNBC