‘Legal team spent RM4.6 million to improve Jho Low’s reputation’

The United States government filings have revealed that fugitive businessman Low Taek Jho’s legal team has spent US$1.1 million (RM4.6 million) to improve his reputation over the past seven months. A report published in the New

York Times (NYT) recently said the services offered to the financier known as Jho Low included providing round-the-clock crisis public relations response, developing Internet search results, as well as building a website with international reports, and legal filings to provide Jho Low’s side of the story.

“The campaign on behalf of Jho Low, carried out by two high-powered law firms, is described in filings submitted last month to the (US) Department of Justice (DoJ) under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, or FARA,” said NYT.

“Legal work done on behalf of foreign clients is exempted from the act’s requirements, but increased scrutiny resulting from the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election prompted those representing Jho Low to disclose their work under FARA.

“The owner of one public relations firm hired by Jho Low’s legal team, James Haggerty, said in one filing that he believed all of his work fell within the litigation exemption to FARA.

“But Haggerty, who is also a lawyer, wrote that he registered anyway ‘given the ambiguity in the law and differing interpretations’. “Haggerty and others have increased their efforts to burnish Jho Low’s image as prosecutors have ramped up an investigation into the disappearance of more than US$2.7 billion from a Malaysian state investment fund called 1Malaysia Development Bhd, or 1MDB.”

The government filings, said NYT, provided an insight into a growing industry called litigation communications, which caters to wealthy people and corporations’ intent in international legal fights.

NYT reported that the two law firms involved in Jho Low’s defence, Kobre & Kim and Schillings International, made payments to three public relation firms and a digital search firm as was disclosed in the FARA fillings.

The lawyers said the money did not come directly from Jho Low, though they did not provide details about its source, it added.

“Kobre & Kim, in its filing, indicated that it had disbursed more than US$818,000 to four firms for work on Jho Low’s behalf. The majority of that roughly US$544,000 went to Haggerty’s public relations firm, PRCG Haggerty.

“This law firm also paid two other PR firms, namely the London-based PHA Group, and Marathon Strategies in New York, which was founded by a Democratic campaign operative who conducted Hilary Clinton’s communications team during her presidential campaign in 2008.”