Bankman-Fried to declare his innocence in FTX case
2023.01.03 13:14
Bankman-Fried to declare his innocence in FTX case
Budrigannews.com – It is anticipated that Sam Bankman-Fried will enter a plea of not guilty on Tuesday to the criminal charges that he defrauded investors in his now-defunct FTX cryptocurrency exchange.
In what prosecutors have described as an epic fraud, Bankman-Fried is accused of stealing billions of dollars from FTX customer deposits to support his Alameda Research hedge fund, buy real estate, and make millions of dollars in political contributions.
He is scheduled to appear in Manhattan before U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan at 2 p.m. EST (1900 GMT). The parents of Bankman-Fried, who co-signed his $250 million bond in December, have been harassed and threatened, his lawyers informed Kaplan earlier on Tuesday.
Last week, a person with knowledge of the situation told Reuters that Bankman-Fried would not plead guilty. A request for clarification was not answered by a Bankman-Fried lawyer. Criminal defendants frequently initially pleading not guilty. At a later time, defendants are free to alter their plea.
Last month, Bankman-Fried was extradited from the Bahamas, where he lived and the exchange was headquartered.
Bankman-Fried has been monitored electronically and has been required to live with his parents, Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried, both professors at Stanford Law School in California, since his bond release.
In a letter, Bankman-Seared’s legal counselors requested that Kaplan safeguard the names of two leftover guarantees for the bond from public divulgence, refering to the “constant flow of compromising correspondence, including a longing that they experience actual damage” that his folks had gotten lately.
Mark Cohen and Christian Everdell, the attorneys, stated that they had no public right to their identities because they were concerned that additional sureties would be subjected to the same treatment. Their request has not yet been decided by Kaplan.
Two counts of wire fraud and six counts of conspiracy, including attempting to launder money and violate campaign finance laws, have been brought against Bankman-Fried. If found guilty, he could spend up to 115 years in prison.
The graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has acknowledged that he made mistakes while running FTX, but he denied being criminally responsible.
Bankman-Fried rode a surge in the value of bitcoin and other digital assets to multiple billions of dollars and prominence as a political donor in the United States before FTX went bust in the beginning of November as a result of a flurry of withdrawals. On November 11, the exchange declared bankruptcy.
When the exchange failed, the 30-year-old crypto mogul’s once-estimated net worth of $26 billion was largely destroyed. Later, he claimed to have $100,000 in his bank account.
John Ray, who worked on the bankruptcy of energy company Enron Corp., is FTX’s new CEO. He has said that FTX is run by people who are “grossly inexperienced” and untrained.
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