Leissner faked ex-wife’s email to spin web of lies, court told

 

Tim Leissner says he posed as his former wife, Judy Chan, for years to converse with his girlfriend at the time, Kimora Lee Simmons. (AFP pic)

NEW YORK: It started with a fake Gmail account. From there, a web of lies that culminated in a faked car accident.

Former Goldman Sachs banker Tim Leissner detailed on Tuesday how he used an email account with his ex-wife’s name for all sorts of shenanigans, beginning with a lie to his girlfriend at the time, Kimora Lee Simmons.

Posing as his then wife Judy Chan, Leissner initially used the account to try to convince Simmons the two were no longer married. But he went on to pose as Chan for years to converse with Simmons about family vacations and other topics.

Leissner is the government’s key witness against former Goldman banker Roger Ng, the only banker from the firm to go to trial in the 1MDB scandal.

Leissner, who has pleaded guilty and is cooperating with the US authorities, has testified that Ng conspired with him to help fugitive financier Low Taek Jho, or Jho Low, siphon billions of dollars from the sovereign wealth fund.

Leissner was questioned about the phony email account by Ng’s lawyer, Marc Agnifilo, who is trying to undermine the banker’s credibility by showing the jury that he is a “rare cunning liar”, as the lawyer told the judge.

While posing as Chan, Leissner declined Simmons’ repeated invitations for Chan and her children to vacation with the former model and her family in Paris, go on an Austrian ski holiday and vacation at a private Caribbean island.

In one email created by Leissner, Chan told Simmons she had been unable to visit because she and her children with Leissner had been injured in a car accident.

“It was an entire life you completely falsified because you made the whole thing up?” an incredulous Agnifilo asked.

“The correspondence, yes,” Leissner said. “But an entire life may be too far.”

Agnifilo showed Leissner an email he had sent Simmons in which Chan claimed she caused the banker to be audited by the Internal Revenue Service.

“I don’t remember, but I see it here,” Leissner said.

Leissner also admitted that he had used the phony email address to communicate with Low after the financier reached out to Chan in 2016 because he was looking to sell fine art, including a painting by Vincent van Gogh. Chan’s family owns China’s top winery, as well as other businesses, he said.

“Jho was trying to monetise the painting and several others and he wanted to see if Judy or her family could be of help,” he said.

Agnifilo asked why he pretended to be Chan while talking to Low.

“I wanted to protect Judy from him,” Leissner said. “I wanted to pacify him or be friends. I wanted to make an effort or appear I was attempting to help him.”

Leissner had previously admitted that he was twice married to two women at the same time, saying that he had faked a divorce document to marry Chan and later photo-shopped a divorce decree to marry Simmons. - FMT