KUALA LUMPUR – Disgraced former Goldman Sachs banker Tim Leissner cooked up quite the storm when he made startling revelations during the ongoing US trial of the 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) financial scandal.
From being allegedly blackmailed by former lover and then Astro Malaysia Holdings Bhd CEO Rohana Rozhan into gifting her a US$10 million (RM41.9 million) home in London, to corruption within Bank Negara Malaysia, Leissner’s testimony offered further insight into the convoluted financial scandal of Malaysia’s former state investment arm.
A star witness in the trial against his former colleague Roger Ng, Leissner is not a stranger to dealings involving massive amounts of money, having operated as a banker and financial marketer since the late 1990s.
He climbed up the ladder over the years, culminating in his appointment as Goldman Sachs’ Southeast Asia chairman in 2014, at the height of the 1MDB scandal he played a vital role in.
Leissner was reported to have already been making US$10 million annually prior to his promotion in his banking firm.
It was also around this time that he supposedly got together with his glamorous celebrity wife, Kimora Lee Simmons, although they are understood to have met two years earlier.
Some believe Leissner’s involvement in one of the world’s largest financial scandals was partly motivated by his relationship with Simmons, with the ex-banker supposedly wanting a more “rich guy” image to keep up with the lavish lifestyle of his lover, as per the New York Post.
But for those familiar and close to him, Leissner was understood to already have a penchant for the slick and glamorous prior to his high-profile relationship.
Described as a partygoer by some, Leissner was even reported to have been a guest at Low Taek Jho’s exclusive birthday party in 2012, in what was dubbed “the most expensive party Las Vegas has seen”, which featured celebrities such as Kim Kardashian, Megan Fox, and Leonardo DiCaprio.
Leissner's invitation to the party comes as no surprise, as he helped Jho Low embezzle billions of 1MDB funds between 2012 and 2013, earning his bank some US$600 million in fees and pocketing tens of millions himself.
His already privileged lifestyle would become more posh, as he sought out money to buy private planes, yachts, and homes in the upscale Beverly Hills.
The German-born Leissner would also later move in to live with Simmons in her US$25 million mansion in Los Angeles, before the pair had a son named Wolfe. Simmons also has three other children then with her two previous husbands.
A look at Simmons’ Instagram account highlights some lavish examples of the lifestyle the pair shared during their time together. They are understood to have been separated in 2020.
Among others, the family had gone on vacation to Punta Mita in Mexico, described by Forbes as the ultimate luxury travel destination.
Simmons regularly shared her holiday travels to fancy destinations with her 2.1 million Instagram followers, including trips to Santorini, Malibu, Athens, Bora Bora, and Paris.
The American personality and businesswoman, however, rejected claims that Leissner had a hand in her business success, including financing her fashion lines, insisting that all funds were her own.
The notorious ex-banker has also had affairs with several Malaysian women while living the high life, the most popular being Rohana from Astro, who is at the centre of attention in the ongoing 1MDB trial in the US.
Their relationship is understood to have lasted from 2003 to 2013, with Leissner testifying that Rohana had threatened to expose his involvement with 1MDB if he did not buy her the US$10 million home in London.
During this period, Leissner also admitted to having an affair with the niece of a former Sarawak chief minister, whom he took to travel to Beijing in 2009 for a meeting with Low and former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak.
This relationship took place while his employer Goldman Sachs was doing business with Sarawak.
Separately, he also told the court of an affair he had with the daughter of a Malaysian ambassador to the US.
After the 1MDB scandal became public, Leissner was told to go on leave by Goldman Sachs in January 2016, before he resigned from the firm soon after.
Leissner entered a guilty plea in 2018 to charges of money laundering and forfeited US$43.7 million, as he negotiated for a deal with the authorities in return for information.
His former Goldman Sachs colleague Ng, who also played a key role in the 1MDB mega scandal, pleaded not guilty to conspiring with the money laundering.
Ng, however, could get off the hook after US prosecutors admitted to not providing his defence team more than 15,000 documents in his ongoing trial, which his lawyer Marc Agnifilo said could have been used against allegations Leissner made.
Leissner was Ng’s boss at the time the scandal took place. – The Vibes, February 24, 2022
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