Housewife Wins Counterclaim Against Developer, Awarded Rm825,000

Chow Cho Tai, a 62-year old housewife whose fake signature and personal particulars have been used in a fraudulent land deal, has been awarded RM825,000 by the High Court, reported Free Malaysia Today.

This comes after Chow proved her counterclaim against seven defendants, who were held liable for malicious prosecution, the tort of conspiracy and negligence.

Her predicament started when her name and personal particulars were used to appoint her as director of property development firm Rimau Indah.

Her particulars were also used in two sale and purchase agreements as well as trust deeds to transfer land from Rimau Indah to Jiwa Rakyat Sdn Bhd.

In 2017, property development firm WT Development – which carries the same business address as Rimau Indah – filed a case against the latter’s liquidators, the Companies Commission of Malaysia (SSM) as well as Chow.

It claims that Chow and Rimau Indah’s liquidators worked together to regain ownership of a parcel of land in Shah Alam, Selangor.

With lawyers Sunil Lopez and Karen Chin representing her, Chow then filed a counterclaim against WT Development as well as six other defendants – Loh Kok Choy, Jiwa Rakyat Sdn Bhd, Te Chong @ Tee Kang Swee, Lim Ah Lim, Chan Yong Sin and legal firm Messrs Abdul Aziz Rahim & Co.

High Court Judicial Commissioner Faizah Jamaludin struck out the suit filed by WT Developments in 2017, and conducted a trial on Chow’s counterclaim.

Sometime in 2015, Chow received a letter from Rimau Indah’s liquidators stating that she was a company director, and asked for Rimau Indah’s statement of affairs, failing which she will allegedly be held liable for criminal prosecution, said Lopez.

A search with SSM showed that Chow was a director of Rimau Indah since 2008.

The liquidators also showed that she had also “signed” a statutory declaration, wherein she agreed to be the company director.

But while a handwriting expert declared the signatures appearing in the documents to be fake, the SSM declined to amend their records, saying it is not within their powers to do so, added Lopez.

The High Court, however, ordered SSM to amend their records after it granted Chow a declaration that she was not a company director.

Despite this development, the liquidators sued Chow along with another director Chin Nyuk Tin as well as Jiwa Rakyat for the land transfer, which was valued at around RM8 million.

The liquidators later withdrew the case against Chow after the handwriting expert’s findings were made known and the court’s subsequent order to SSM.

WT Development, Rimau Indah’s previous shareholder, then filed a case to stop the liquidators from securing the land.

In ruling in favour of Chow, Faizah also ordered the defendants to pay another RM50,000 in costs.

Source: PropertyGuru