HONG KONG, Sept 26 — Carson Yeung, the owner of English football team Birmingham City on trial for money laundering, will testify next month in a reversal of an earlier decision not to take the stand.
District Court Judge Douglas Yau today allowed the Hong Kong businessman’s application to reopen his defence after it had earlier rested. The trial will resume October 15.
Yeung, 53, pleaded not guilty to five charges of laundering HK$721.3 million (RM298.5 million) in deposits from parties including a Macau casino operator and securities firms over a seven-year period to 2007. The son of a vegetable stand salesman ran a successful hair salon and parlayed his earnings into savvy investments in real estate and stocks, Yeung’s lawyers said.
Yeung was chairman of Grandtop International Holdings Ltd., which in 2007 bought a 29.9 per cent stake in the West Midlands-based football club in the U.K. for £15 million (RM77.1 million). Yeung bought the rest of the club in 2009, paying £81.5 million to David and Ralph Gold and David Sullivan, and Grandtop changed its name to Birmingham International Holdings Ltd.
Police allege that the purchase was partly funded by money connected to his money-laundering charges. His defence says he earned that money from trading stocks.
Yeung was arrested in June 2011 and shares of Birmingham International have been suspended since. The football club had a 42 per cent drop in sales for the six months ended December 31, 2012, after the team’s relegation from the top-flight Premier League 2011, according to its interim report.
Birmingham International issued a profit warning September 9 that it attributed to the sale of players registrations. The company said last month it was still in preliminary negotiations over the sale of its stake in the football club.
The case is Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and Yeung Ka-sing Carson, DCCC860/2011 in the Hong Kong District Court. — Bloomberg
