HONG KONG: The High Court has granted a two-week extension to feng shui master Tony Chan Chun-chuen before he must file any appeal against a ruling which awarded the multi-billion dollar estate of the late Nina Wang Kung Yu-sum to rival claimant Chinachem Charitable Foundation.

Chan reportedly is contemplating an appeal on the grounds the judge erred in his ruling concerning the weighing of expert evidence during the sensational probate battle which wrapped up early this month.

Following a two-month court battle and a four-month wait for the judgment, Court of First Instance Justice Johnson Lam called Wang's signature on a will produced in 2006 that gave the entire estate to Chan a "high-quality simulation".

Chan was arrested shortly after the judgment on suspicion of forging a document, police said. He has yet to be charged and was ordered to report to police in mid-March.

Speaking at the High Court yesterday, senior counsel Godfrey Lam said a submission on behalf of Chan that Justice Lam made errors in his judgment would be sent to the court by March 19.

The original appeals submission deadline was set for this coming Tuesday.

Justice Lam accepted Lam's argument that more time was needed to prepare a proper appeal submission due to the case's complexity.

Lam said the submission would include arguments that Justice Lam had erred in his judgment when he sided with expert testimony by Chinachem Charitable Foundation's handwriting expert Robert Radley who found signatures on the contested 2006 will and other documents had "significant differences" while Chan's handwriting expert Paul Westwood found there were "significant similarities".

Justice Lam said he would not enter into a debate on the points of appeal raised by Lam but conceded the appeal was "not hopeless".

Barrister for Chinachem Charitable Foundation Jeremy Chan opposed the application, saying Justice Lam's judgment was based on factual findings based on "logic with no magic to it".

The impending appeal adds yet another turn in the battle over the multi-billion fortune which was the subject of an earlier, nearly 10-year legal battle between Wang and her father-in-law. The fight over the fortune began after Wang's husband Teddy Wang Tei-huei was declared legally dead in 1999. Teddy Wang disappeared after he was kidnapped for a second time in 1990.

Wang died just two years after being awarded the estate by the Court of Final Appeal.

(HK Edition 02/26/2010 page1)