The 64-year-old is contesting this week’s unexpected conviction for criminal defamation of a Malaysian monarch.
During a one-day hearing, a local magistrates’ court sentenced her to two years in prison.
Ms. Rewcastle Brown claimed to the BBC that she was being singled out for attention due to her involvement in the $1MDB controversy.
In what is regarded as the largest kleptocracy case in history, $4.5 billion (£3.9 billion) was embezzled from the Malaysian sovereign fund, which former prime minister Najib Razak created.
Top Hollywood stars were entangled in it, Goldman Sachs bankers were dragged down, and the Wall Street giant faced its first criminal charges.
Najib was imprisoned in 2022, but he is still accused of numerous other offenses. He disavows any misconduct.
The Sarawak Report – The Inside Story of the 1MDB Expose by Ms. Rewcastle Brown was found to have criminally defamed Malaysia’s former queen Nur Zahirah on Wednesday by the Kuala Terengganu Magistrates’ Court.
Ms. Rewcastle Brown said she was not informed beforehand or given the chance to present her own defense in court. Her attorneys have already asked a higher court to overturn the decision due to infractions of the Criminal Procedure Code.
“I’m concerned that this is malevolent and driven by politics. She told the BBC, “And I see it as payback for my public interest journalism.””I believe that many of Malaysia’s affluent and influential individuals are seeking payback for my identification of Najib Razak’s corruption. Razak is still a well-liked, powerful, and wealthy former prime leader.
“And I think that it’s no coincidence that just two or three days after [he] failed to get a pardon from the [Malaysian] King that would have let him out of jail after a fraction of his sentence, that this sentence was then passed against me” .
The decision to imprison Rewcastle Brown was deemed “outrageous” by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), which also urged Malaysia to revoke the sentence and “quit harassing the journalist over her crucial reporting on the country’s 1MDB scandal, recognized as one of the biggest-ever corruption cases in history.”
Shawn Crispin, senior Southeast Asia representative for CPJ, stated in a statement released on Friday that “the harsh ruling will deter all reporters from investigating official corruption in Malaysia and represents a clear and present danger to press freedom in the country.”
