Dr Michael Teo
MIRI: Miri MP Dr Micheal Teo Yu has filed a suit against a bank and two of its officers over the loss of his fixed deposit savings in the bank.
He said the writ of summons against the three defendants were filed at the High Court here after he had lodged a police report in May upon discovering that his fixed deposit in Singapore dollars was missing from the bank.
Teo said in a statement that the bank officers had turned up without an appointment at his clinic on April 4 in 2014 and offered higher returns of seven per cent interest for his fixed deposit within two years.
A few weeks later, he said they returned to get him to sign more documents but he was not given a copy and they did not provide any explanation or warning that it was an investment and that money could be lost.
“Defendant did not reveal to plaintiff that it was to buy an investment. plaintiff was not explained or shown any brochures or pamphlets. Thus, plaintiff was given impression that it was another renewal of fixed deposit,” he said in the statement referring to himself as the plaintiff.
He said he only found out years later that it was used to purchase junk bond of a failed company in Singapore.
He also said he was not the only one to have been approached by the bank officers for money, and that they preyed on customers who had at least SGD250,000 (RM765608.50) fixed deposit in the bank.
Dr Teo said in a letter of enquiry to Bank Negara during a Parliament session, he had learnt that the said bond should not have been allowed to be sold to Malaysians as it had not obtained approval from the central bank.
Dr Teo had lodged a police report on March 5, alleging that he had been scammed of SGD272,893.84 (RM835,719.37) from his fixed deposit account.