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The criminal trial of FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried will proceed with the eight charges initially laid out by United States prosecutors — at least for now.
In court on June 14 AdmissionUS Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors wrote a letter to District Judge Lewis Kaplan saying they would proceed to prosecute Bankman-Fried in December 2022 on the eight charges brought against her.
DOJ lawyers cited a motion filed by Bankman-Fried in the Bahamas, arguing that many of the 13 charges she faced were Not in the original indictment, which was the basis for his extradition from the country. As this is likely to be a lengthy process, prosecutors wrote, they “are prepared to proceed to trial as scheduled on the counts contained in the original indictment.”
“It now appears that litigation of that motion will take some time and may not be resolved until near or after the trial date.”
On 14 June, the Supreme Court of the Bahamas ruled that Bankman-Fried should be given an opportunity to formally challenge the new charges before the country could agree to them.
Following Bankman-Fried’s extradition, the DOJ dropped charges of fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud in February, as well as an additional four charges in March of bribing Chinese officials.
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Bankman-Fried is the founder and former CEO of crypto exchange FTX. He was originally indicted in December in connection with the management of the failed exchange. In November the exchange faced a liquidity crisis, which was followed by bankruptcy shortly thereafter.
FTX owes creditors more than $3 billion. Prosecutors allege that Bankman-Fried commingled client funds and misled investors about FTX’s risk management practices, causing losses to investors and clients.
Carolyn Ellison, the former CEO of sister company Alameda Research, and Gary Wang, co-founder of FTX, have both pleaded guilty to fraud charges in connection with the exchange’s collapse. However, Bankman-Fried has claimed that the collapse was not due to management mistakes and fraud.
