Hazel Siau

On the court record

Hazel Siau appears in the corpus in a spread of civil and commercial matters from probate to cross-border jurisdiction, argued from the High Court (Mahkamah Tinggi) to the Federal Court (Mahkamah Persekutuan). One High Court matter, appearing for the defendant, was a succession dispute over the contents of three safe deposit boxes belonging to a deceased person, and whether those contents fell to be distributed according to her last will; after a trial the court found that the plaintiff had failed to discharge his burden of establishing his case against the defendants and dismissed the claim with costs. A Federal Court matter, appearing for the appellant, raised questions of considerable doctrinal weight: whether witnesses enjoy absolute immunity from civil liability for evidence given in judicial proceedings, the application of the doctrine of finality of litigation, whether the tort of malicious prosecution applies in civil proceedings in Malaysia, and whether fraud based on perjury is a recognised and actionable tort — issues that go to the boundary between holding a wrongdoer to account and protecting the integrity and finality of the trial process. A third matter, in the High Court and appearing for the plaintiff, was a jurisdictional contest in a substantial commercial claim: whether the Malaysian court had jurisdiction over a foreign law firm under section 23(1) of the Courts of Judicature Act 1964 and Order 11 of the Rules of Court, in a claim brought by 1Malaysia Development Berhad alleging dishonest assistance and conspiracy to injure by unlawful means. The three matters range from the private and factual — who is entitled to the contents of a deceased's safe deposit boxes — to the systemic and doctrinal, namely how far the law will go to protect the integrity of the trial process and how far the Malaysian courts will reach to assume jurisdiction over a foreign party. Across the appearances the practice combines the evidentiary demands of estate litigation, appellate argument on the immunities and torts that surround the litigation process, and the service and jurisdiction questions that arise when a claim reaches beyond Malaysia to a foreign defendant.