Earlier this month, Macau’s Court of First Instance rejected a request by Asian American Entertainment Corp (AAEC) for a 30-day extension of the deadline to appeal a court ruling in its decade-long lawsuit against the Las Vegas Sands Corp.
On April 28, the court ruled in favor of the Sands Corp. in the protracted civil case, led by AAEC’s Marshall Hao Shi-sheng. At the time, the court also sentenced Asian American Entertainment “for litigation in bad faith.”
According to GGRAsia, attorneys for Hao asked for the extension based on the fact that the 99-page court ruling was only made available in Chinese. Portuguese and Chinese are both official languages in Macau; Hao’s legal team was led by Portuguese-speaking lawyer Jorge Menezes.
Macau Business reported that on May 11, the court indicates that while the Chinese and Portuguese languages are official Macau SAR languages with “equal dignity and valid means of expression in judicial acts” it underscored the optional element of its use by the court.
“Although there are norms established for considering and determining the language used in processual acts this does not bind the court to select the official language of mandated or appointed legal representatives,” the court decision reads.
The court also considered that there is no legal basis supporting that it is required to translate the decision to another official language, and rejected that this action was hampering the legal right to access the courts.
A legal connection to the plaintiff indicated the legal team was “disappointed” with the court’s decision as it consider it “impossible” for a Portuguese lawyer to review a 99-page judgment in Chinese within 10 days.
The same source indicated AAEC is preparing to still submit an appeal on May 13. The typical deadline for filing an appeal in cases is 10 days.
In its decision, the court said it was not obligated to deliver its sentence in a particular official language.
In its original claim, AAEC asked for MOP3 billion (US$375 million) in damages resulting from the alleged breach of contract by Sands in 2002, when it successfully bid for a casino license in Macau. In 2019, Hao’s company increased the amount of its claim to about US$12 billion, allegedly representing lost profits from 2004 to 2018.
Later still, representatives for Hao said the company was entitled to at least US$7.5 billion in damages, due to the alleged breach of agreements by Sands, which originally teamed with AAEC for a Macau gaming concession but then changed partners. It entered into a successful partnership with Hong Kong entrepreneur Lui Che Woo via Galaxy Casino SA, now Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd.
