FORMER Goldman Sachs banker Roger Ng said he is unable to meet US prosecutors’ demand that he forfeit US$35 (RM158) million because the Malaysian government has already taken all of his money, Bloomberg reports.

Ng was ordered to pay the sum as ill-gotten gains after he was also sentenced to 10 years in jail by a New York court last week for his role in the defrauding of 1Malaysia Development Bhd.

US district judge Margo Brodie has yet to rule on the forfeiture but has directed the two sides to submit arguments on whether the amount sought by prosecutors violated the Eighth Amendment, which prohibits excessive fines along with cruel and unusual punishment.

Ng’s lawyer, Marc Agnifilo, argued that his client had no money in any case because the Malaysian government had already seized more than US$35 million from 11 accounts held by his family. 

“The police officials of Malaysia were very clear that the police wanted all of the money in the different accounts; not just the return of those funds it had formally traced to 1MDB,” Agnifilo wrote.

Agnifilo said the demand also violated the Eighth Amendment of the US constitution.

Brodie said she believed that forfeiture was “statutorily required” for the crimes of which Ng was convicted but wanted both sides to address Agnifilo’s argument that the US$35 million demand was “grossly disproportionate”.

Ng was found guilty in April last year of conspiring to violate US anti-bribery laws and launder money. His former Goldman boss and 1MDB co-conspirator, Tim Leissner, pleaded guilty and was the government’s star witness against him. – March 16, 2023.