U.S. government to jury in 1MDB trial: Convict even if you don’t believe our star witness.

A federal prosecutor told jurors on Monday that they had received enough evidence to convict a former Goldman Sachs banker for his role in one of the biggest international money laundering and bribery schemes even without the testimony of the government’s star witness.

“You already know the defendant is guilty from other evidence in the case,” Alixandra E. Smith, an assistant U.S. attorney, said during the government’s closing argument in the trial of Roger Ng in federal court in Brooklyn.

Mr. Ng is accused of receiving $35 million in illegal kickbacks from a scheme to steal billions of dollars from the once-big Malaysian sovereign wealth fund known as 1MDB.

Over the course of the trial, Tim Leissner, a former Goldman partner who pleaded guilty and became the government’s star witness, emerged as a controversial figure, and it is not surprising federal prosecutors want the jury to not focus too much on his testimony.

During six days of a grueling cross-examination he admitted to lying a lot in life. He was forced to admit to initially lying to federal agents, to his fellow partners at Goldman and to his wives and girlfriends.

But Ms. Smith said Mr. Leissner did not lie when he testified in federal court in Brooklyn to the key facts of the scheme, which was funded by a series of bond offerings that Goldman arranged for the 1MDB fund.

When it was time for Mr. Ng’s lawyer to present his closing arguments, he did not waste time calling out Mr. Leissner. The lawyer, Marc Agnifilo, said Mr. Leissner was a man who “will lie if it suits his interest.” He said that, despite what the prosecution had said, without Mr. Leissner’s testimony the government could not connect Mr. Ng to the conspiracy to steal billions from the 1MDB fund.

“There is no evidence that connects Roger,” Mr. Agnifilo said. “There is not a dirty email. Not a bad text message.”

By contrast, Mr. Agnifilo said, the jury had seen text messages in which Mr. Leissner was instructed on whom to pay bribe money to by Jho Low, a flamboyant Malaysian businessman who was the architect of the scheme and is a fugitive believed to be living in China.

Mr. Agnifilo said Mr. Leissner had lied to the jury just as he had done other times in his life.

“It’s a lifetime of lying,” said Mr. Agnifilo. “This is lying on a rare level.”

Last week, the jury heard testimony from Mr. Ng’s wife, Hwee Bin Lim, who said the $35 million she and her husband received was the proceeds from a $6 million investment she made with Mr. Leissner’s second wife, Judy Chan.

The defense has argued Mr. Ng and his wife had been unaware that some of the money Ms. Chan transferred to them had been looted from 1MDB. Mr. Leissner has acknowledged getting tens of millions of dollars in illicit proceeds in the scheme.

The case could go to the jury as soon as Tuesday afternoon.