Chan had laid claim to Wang’s fortune as her former lover, presenting in court a 2006 will naming him as the sole heir of her estate. But after a marathon probate hearing, a high court judge ruled this week that the will is a forgery, while saying it was unlikely the tycoon would have left Chan all her money.

Chan’s will contradicted an earlier will drafted by Wang in 2002, leaving her fortune to the Chinachem Charitable Foundation, with links to her family.

Wang, known as “Little Sweetie” after a Japanese manga cartoon character and her giggly persona, was one of Asia’s wealthiest women with a business empire which included the Chinachem Group, Hong Kong’s largest private property developer. She died of cancer in 2007 aged 69.

After her death, former lover Tony Chan revealed a 2006 will which bequeathed Wang’s estate to him, contradicting an earlier will in 2002 which left the fortune to the Chinachem Charitable Foundation.

The high court described Wang and Chan as having a “relationship”, but said it could not have led to the tycoon leaving him all her money.

“The court does not believe the relationship was such that Nina was prepared to give her entire estate irrespective of her other commitments and responsibilities,” the court said in a summary of the judgment.

It ruled the 2006 will was a forgery and that signatures on that document which purported to belong to Wang and a witness were “highly skilled simulation(s)”.

“The court finds that he lied and withheld relevant information from the court regarding the circumstances leading to the preparation of the document,” the court judgment said.

Wang was dubbed “Little Sweetie” after a Japanese manga cartoon character and was known for her trademark braided pig-tails, mini-skirts and giggly persona.

Her brother, Kung Yan-sum, said the family would leave it to the government to decide if any action should be taken against Chan, whose lawyer said he would appeal.

“If they investigate, of course we will support, we are good citizens,” Kung said. “If there is a criminal element, the government will do something. I believe in the rule of law.”

The Shanghai-born Wang inherited most of her wealth from her husband, Teddy, who was kidnapped in 1990 and never seen alive again, despite the payment of a US$33 million ransom.

Wang later fought an acrimonious legal battle with her nonagenarian father-in-law amid claims of adultery and murder. She finally wrested control of Teddy’s estate in 2005.

The day before billionaire Nina Wang Kung Yu- sum died, Chinachem was told it had purchased 30 million (HK$379.02 million) worth of shares in one of fung shui master Tony Chan Chun-chuen’s companies.

Director Joseph Leung Wing-kong also said that a day after Wang’s death, Chinachem’s sales manager Ng Shung-mo told him about a call from Chan’s solicitor, during which a will naming Chan as a beneficiary was mentioned.

To a question from Judge Johnson Lam Man-hon yesterday, Leung confirmed he was next in command to Wang in the group’s hierarchy.

Leung said that on April 2, 2007 – the day before Wang’s death – Chinachem received a fax from investment bank Goldman Sachs saying the group had purchased a further 30 million worth of shares in RCG Holdings, then a private company.

“At the time we already had 21 percent [stake],” Leung told the Court of First Instance.

“If we were to purchase this [new] block, I was worried about the shareholder level we would reach. I was concerned we would have takeover responsibilities.”

Leung said he asked Wang’s personal assistant, Dinly Au Ying-ling, to get instructions from Wang on the matter, but a specific reply was never received.

Leung also asked Au to talk with Thomas Chan, a Goldman Sachs executive who handled the shares transaction.

Thomas Chan told Au the transaction had been arranged by a man surnamed Chan at RCG Holdings. He also told Au he had called Wang’s mobile phone to obtain confirmation of the deal. Leung said nobody had any knowledge of the transaction until the fax from Goldman Sachs was received.

RCG Holdings went public on the Hong Kong stock exchange in February 2009.

Leung testified that on April 4, 2007, he was told by Ng about a call solicitor Winfield Wong Wing-cheung had received from Haldanes, Tony Chan’s legal representatives, regarding a will involving Wang’s alleged lover and fung shui master.

Leung said he could not recall whether the term “partial will” had been used, or if the contents of the will were mentioned, as he was concentrating on consoling Au over Wang’s death and taking care of other matters.

“On the one hand, I had to console Dinly. On the other, Ng was talking. I could not pay attention to so many things,” Leung said.

“At that time, what was more important for us was the arrangement of funeral services, and to maintain the confidence of colleagues.”

Billionaire Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum believed someone placed a curse on her, just months before she died of cancer in April 2007, a court heard yesterday.

Dr David Ho Wai-tak also told the Court of First Instance that Wang appeared mentally unstable when he met her in September 2006, and when she told him a friend had offered to exorcise the curse by taking her underwear and strands of hair to the mainland.

Ho, a general surgeon at Baptist and St Teresa’s hospitals, testified he first met Wang in 2004, when he acted on behalf of Baptist to purchase a block of property from the Chinachem Group.

A few days after a meeting between Chinachem and the hospital, at which the billionaire was not present, Wang called Ho and said she would like to seek a medical opinion from him.

The two arranged a lunch date, during which Wang appointed Ho as an “honorary medical adviser.”

The third and final occasion Ho saw Wang was in September 2006.

Ho said he was shocked because Wang had lost a lot of weight and her voice had changed.

Wang told him she felt very uncomfortable and was a bit scared as “she felt someone was following her and doing her harm.”

“[Wang said] `I thought recently somebody has put a curse on me,”‘ Ho testified. “I figured she was … mentally and physically not well … sometimes mentally incoherent.” He said he advised Wang to see a doctor.

Wang then told Ho a good friend – whom she did not identify – had said he could help her. She said the friend “asked me for my underwear and strands of hair, which he could take to the mainland to do something [with them]. He said after that I would be okay.”

Wang also told Ho people had asked her to sign blank documents, and that she was still being followed.

Fung shui master Yu Chi-lun was another to testify yesterday. He had provided fung shui services for Wang in 2005. Yu had been anonymously sought by Wang to check on the compatibility between her and Tony Chan Chun- chuen. Chan is expected to testify today.

The signature on a will which leaves a multibillion-dollar fortune to fung shui master Tony Chan Chun-chuen is a forgery, the Court of First Instance heard.

Robert Radley – a handwriting expert for the Chinachem Charitable Foundation which is contesting Chan’s claim – said the signature and handwriting of Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum on the 2006 document appear unnatural and uncharacteristic compared to 125 known signatures and writings of the late real estate tycoon.

Describing Hong Kong as an excellent source of penmanship, British expert Radley said yesterday: “Ninety percent of forged documents seen in England are absolute rubbish.”

But he said the authenticity of the signature of Chinachem sales manager Ng Shung-mo on the will is inconclusive.

On Monday, Radley told the hearing that the signature of solicitor Winfield Wong Wing-cheung on the will is false.

On his second day of testimony, Radley said the “tremendous accumulation of differences” found in the “Nina TH Wang” signature led to the conclusion that it could not be her writing.

He pointed out at least eight differences to Judge Johnson Lam Man-hon.

One of the most fundamental differences he observed was in the “ang” structure of “Wang” in which the pen movement lacks smoothness and fluency.

“The rhythm of the stroke is wrong,” said Radley, adding the forger failed to understand what he was copying when mimicking Wang’s y-like letter “H” in her signature.

Wang’s writing was fine before and even two days after the signing of the disputed will, but four signatures signed around the same time showed signs of degradation, Radley said.

In some of the writings known to be Wang’s, she appeared to have lost control of her pen. “This poor woman could barely hold the pen,” he added.

Chan’s lawyer, Ian Mill, accused Radley of having presumed that the 2006 will was forged when preparing the reports, because he did not address the significance of the similarities but only the differences found between the problem signature and those known to be authentic. Radley called it a ridiculous suggestion, adding it is standard practice to consider anything else to be similar as long as it is not set out to be different.

Mill said Australian expert Paul Westwood, called by Chan, identified 44 similarities while Radley saw only four.

Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum paid fung shui master Liu Jiantong HK$328 million for rituals aimed at prolonging her life in wake of the tycoon being diagnosed with cancer, Wang’s secretary said.

This was on top of the almost HK$3 billion that the late Chinachem Group tycoon paid just before her death to fung shui master Tony Chan Chun-chuen, who is battling Chinachem Charitable Foundation for control of Wang’s vast fortune.

The secretary, Dinly Au Yin-ling, told the Court of First Instance the HK$328 million paid to Liu was for fung shui rituals such as placing big joss stick urns in three Chinachem buildings.

She said Wang hired several fung shui masters but never heard her mentioning Chan.

Au, pictured leaving court today, said she does not remember seeing Chan in all the time she had been working for Wang until the night of April 3, 2007, when her boss died.

Chan’s senior counsel, Ian Mill challenged Au over her rendition of Wang’s state of mind in her last days, particularly how Wang could have appointed her siblings to the foundation just days before she died when she was supposed to have lost the ability to make important business decisions.

But Au stuck to her stance that Wang was fairly lucid three days before she died because she could still indicate where Easter eggs Au had brought to celebrate with her boss should be placed.

The late billionaire Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum would leap out of her grave and slap fung shui master Tony Chan Chung-chuen across the face if she knew what he was doing, her brother said outside the Court of First Instance yesterday.

Doctor Kung Yan-sum also rejected an earlier characterization of Chan by one of his other sisters, saying that comparing Chan to an eunuch was an insult to all men, as he was more like a male concubine to the sixth century Empress Wu Zetian.

In completing his testimony in the probate battle between Chan and the Chinachem Foundation for Wang’s assets, Kung said he fully believed righteousness will eventually triumph.

Kung called Chan a liar, and accused him of taking advantage of his late sister – even after her death.

He said Chan’s motive for claiming he was Wang’s lover was very obvious. If Wang knew what Chan was doing, she would “jump out from her grave and give him two slaps in the face.”

Kung also recalled that during one of his conversations with Wang, he had described Chan as having the “face of a thief, and brain of a dog.” After that, Wang stopped mentioning Chan in his presence, Kung said.

Kung said he once watched a video of Wang and Chan dancing. His sister looked very beautiful, dressed in a Qing Dynasty gown, and danced very well, while Chan was like a lowly servant kneeling before her.

Earlier, Kung told the court that he recalled being awakened one night by a call from Wang in the Hong Kong Sanatorium, complaining that no one was attending to her. He said he rushed to the hospital and ran into Chan in the corridor.

Demonstrating how Chan kept his head lowered the entire time, Kung said the fung shui master ran away upon seeing him.

“He was acting like a thief. I almost wanted to call the police,” Kung said.

He said Chan never dared to look him in the face, so he asked Wang why Chan feared him, but his sister responded only with a smirk.

Chan’s lawyer, Edward Chan King-sang, suggested Kung was only trying to get media attention by making derogatory comments.

Kung protested, using a Chinese saying which loosely means “don’t measure a gentleman’s mind with a villain’s heart.”

Edward Chan also suggested that Tony Chan had only claimed to have prayed to Buddha for Wang in meeting with Wang’s siblings on April 4, 2007 – the day after Wang died.

Kung insisted Tony Chan did say he could talk, instead of pray, to Buddha, and was able to take on the burden of Wang’s illness transfer.

Kung also recalled Wang was unwilling to let her staff know she was sick, although she was unable to eat without vomiting towards the later part of 2006. She told her staff she was trying to lose weight when they inquired about her health.

Fung shui master Tony Chan Chun- chuen appeared happy just one day after the death of his alleged lover, the late billionaire Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum, Wang’s younger sister Molly Gong Zhongxin told the Court of First Instance yesterday.Gong said before meeting Chan in person in March 2007 her perception of the man was 60 percent unfavorable. After meeting him, she formed the opinion he was dishonest and that his statements were calculated to make the family believe he was close to Wang.

Gong said she did not believe Wang had made a will leaving her entire estate to Chan as she would have told her siblings if that was her plan.

Chan’s lawyer Ian Mill asked if it ever occurred to Gong that Wang did not tell them because she knew they would disapprove.

“Why would we? We never told her what to do unless it concerned her medical condition,” Gong said.

Gong recalled Chan telling her he could speak to the Buddha to prolong Wang’s life, but he “didn’t want others to know he had the special power.”

Gong added Wang played the dominant role in her relationship with Chan, though when it came to fung shui, Chan exercised a great deal of influence over her.

She accused Chan of taking advantage of Wang when she was fragile. “Everyone said her [abducted] husband [Teddy Wang Teh-huei] was gone. Only one person said he was still alive. When she was sick, doctors said her illness was treatable but incurable, and he [Chan] appeared again,” Gong said. Gong said Chan was a yes man to Wang though he also acted like a “life saving straw.”

Gong recalled Wang never thought she would die, even in the final stages of her illness.

Wang’s younger brother Kung Yan- sum who, like Gong, is a medical doctor, took the stand for the first time yesterday.

He said Wang was a great businesswoman. “There are many successful businessmen in the world, but only a few have such a big heart and the generosity to give all her assets to society and charity,” Kung said.

He admitted there are instances when “one loose thread can be found in 100 tightly knit threads.”

He said in business Wang was not a forgetful woman but on certain topics she would let things slide.

“She wanted to forget her age. She always joked she was only 18 years old,” he said.

Kung denied a suggestion made by Chan’s lawyer Edward Chan King-sang that his relationship with Wang was not that close. “You forgot the Chinese saying `blood is thicker than water.’ There was not one day when we were distant from each other,” Kung said.

Kung recalled Wang telling him and other siblings and their mother that someone had advised her against being too close to them because their birth signs conflicted with hers.

A statement from Harvard University medical expert Dr Philip Lang was read by Chinachem Charitable Foundation lawyer Denis Chang.

Lang said there were at least three occasions when Wang telephoned him to say she could not go to Boston for treatments because her fung shui master had said she should not fly.

Wang also told Lang that Gong could not accompany her to one of the consultations because “it was not good.”

Meanwhile, Edward Chan suggested Teddy Wang was infertile so none of the efforts Nina made in hopes of bearing a child was to prepare for his return.

Kung said Nina had a miscarriage a long time ago and Teddy had a diseased kidney removed. It was possible this might lead to infertility but there was no medical evidence to support the claim.

First report:

Nina Wang believed in only two kinds of love – one life, one love and unconditional love – her younger sister told the Court of First Instance yesterday.

Molly Gong Zhongxin said the relationship between Wang and fung shui master Tony Chan Chun-chuen fell into neither category.

“There was no real love nor real emotion. It was purely a monetary relationship,” she said.

In rejecting the suggestion made by Chan’s lawyer Ian Mill that Wang and Chan had a loving relationship, Gong said they could only be considered friends since their relationship revolved around a fung shui master and his client.

“My elder sister was a sentimental woman,” Gong said, adding that she had been under Wang’s influence with regard to concepts of love since she was young.
Wang regarded true love to be very sacred, especially to women of her generation.

“One life, one love is what my sister and [her husband] Teddy [Wang Teh-huei] enjoyed,” Gong said.

The words “one life, one love” were written in English in Teddy Wang’s disputed 1990 will. He was kidnapped in April 1990 and never found. He was declared legally dead in 1999.

“True love does not demand rewards and no money should be needed. My sister gave much money to Tony Chan. It was all about money,” Gong said.

Gong cited an occasion when Wang visited her in the United States during which her sister spent 15 minutes wiping and cleaning their old stove.

Both were so nostalgic they could not bear to throw it away.

Gong said she and her little sister Kung Yau- sum had looked at all the video tapes and photos taken by Wang and Gong and the gifts which were said to be presented by Wang to Chan.

Gong said her sister noticed Wang did not appear happy in the pictures.

“I remarked they looked like Empress Dowager Cixi and eunuch Li Lianying and my little sister absolutely agreed with me,” Gong said.

Second report:

The younger sister of Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum yesterday accused fung shui master Tony Chan Chun-chuen of encouraging the late billionaire to undergo fertility injections, which may have brought on the cancer that eventually killed her.

Testifying in the Court of First Instance in the probate battle between Chinachem Charity Foundation and Chan for Wang’s assets, Molly Gong Zhongxin recalled her brother Kung Yan-sum telling her that Chan had attended medical school in Canada but terminated his studies after allegedly committing a blunder – a claim Chan later denied in a statement.

Gong, a doctor in the United States, claimed there was an 80 percent chance Wang’s ovarian cancer was due to 15 years of oestrogen injections.

Gong said she only learned of the injections when she accompanied Wang to Harvard University Hospital for cancer treatment in February 2004.

Her medical record also mentioned that Wang wanted to make a clone in Italy, but Gong was not sure whether Wang put her thoughts into action. Gong said her brother, who is also a practicing doctor, jumped with surprise when he learned of the injections, saying he would not even approve a low dosage.

Gong said a fung shui master Wang had addressed as her “godfather” turned out to be Chan.

Breaking down in tears, Gong recalled that Wang was sure her master would save her and had guaranteed she would live to at least 90 because he could speak directly to the heavenly god.

Wang also refused to move out from her living quarters in the Chinachem office because her master had cleared the place of “ghosts and evil” and that “no sword or gun can penetrate,” Gong said.

Chan’s lawyer Ian Mill asked whether Gong felt angry because Wang had hidden much of her personal life from her.

“I am angry because my sister was such a smart woman, yet she believed so firmly in fung shui,” Gong said.

“There must have been a bad influence cast on her, telling her that she was destined to have a child, that she was still young and a little girl, that she would live for a very long time.”

In a meeting with Chan on April 4, 2007 – the day after Wang died at the age of 69 – Gong said the fung shui master claimed he was against Wang getting oestrogen injections and that he thought it was a crazy idea.

Gong also said Wang had stopped her from attending treatment sessions because her master had said they were “destined to have a conflict.” The ban was extended to her mother, in her 90s, because she was born in the year of the tiger, she added.

Gong said the master had also advised Wang several times against flying, forcing Wang to postpone three to four cancer treatment sessions in Boston.

She said Wang appeared to have trusted her master even more than she trusted the renowned overseas medical experts treating her.

But as Wang’s health continued to deteriorate, Gong once overheard Wang speaking on the phone in Boston.

“She said: `You’re so useless. I’m not getting better,”‘ Gong recalled.

The hearing continues.

Third report:

The late Chinachem Group chief Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum opted for high doses of hormone injections over a period of 15 years in the hope it would help her become pregnant, her sister Kung Chung-sum testified in the High Court.

Kung, who broke down in court, said she believes the hormone treatment had contributed to her sister getting cancer.

There was widespread media speculation at one stage that Wang died in April 2007 from ovarian cancer.

Kung said she strongly believes Wang had been under the influence of ”someone” who led her to believe she could have a child and therefore caused her to take the risky hormone injections.

The late Chinachem Group tycoon Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum was consulting Tony Chan Chun-chuen on fung shui matters even when it became apparent that she would lose her fight with cancer.

Kung Yan-sum told a probate hearing in the High Court she overheard Wang, her sister, consulting Chan on fung shui matters such as the the most suitable hospital floor and room numbers even at the late stages of her fight with the disease.

Kung said this in citing reasons for why she believed the relationship between Wang and Chan was nothing more than that between an employer and a fung shui consultant.

Kung was testifying for the Chinachem Charitable Foundation, which is involved in a probate battle with Chan for Wang’s huge estate.

She told the court the reason she and her siblings did not accompany Wang when she sought medical treatment in the United States was because the tycoon believed in fung shui so much that she thought their birth dates were not conducive to her recovery.

Kung earlier in the day told the court Wang believed that she had within her body sarira – bead-shaped objects that are purportedly found among the ashes of cremated Buddhist spiritual masters.

Chan revealed this to Wang’s family the day after she died in April 2007 in a meeting he called by saying he wanted to return a lot of things that belonged to the late tycoon, including her signature pigtails and photos.

In a tense meeting, Wang’s three siblings – Kung, another sister and brother – challenged Chan over his role in their late sister’s life.

When Chan told the three siblings that he had known their sister for 17 years and gave her massages everyday to ease her headaches, one of the sisters, Kung Chung-sum, expressed surprise and asked the fung shui master if his wife didn’t mind him doing that to another woman.

Chan said his wife did.

Kung Yan-sum, pictured outside court today with Kung Chung-sum on her left, testified she then sought Chan’s help with the funeral arrangements.

When Chan said that the late tycoon, besides believing she had sarira, was also afraid of insects, the brother, Kung Yan-san, suggested Wang be cremated and a decision was later taken to proceed with it.

The hearing continues.