Federal prosecutors in New York claim they are dropping several criminal charges against Sam Bankman-Fried.
QUICK FACTS:
- Federal prosecutors said they would drop several criminal charges, for the time being, against crypto executive Sam Bankman-Fried if the judge agrees to try him at a later date.
- The offer to dissolve five of the 13 charges followed a ruling earlier this week in the Bahamas that granted Bankman-Fried permission to challenge the additional charges.
- “Severing those counts seems to be appropriate given the developments in the Bahamas this week,” prosecutor Nathan Rehn said.
- Bankman-Fried, who has pleaded not guilty, is scheduled to appear in court in October.
U.S. DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK JUDGE LEWIS KAPLAN ON DISMISSING CHARGES AGAINST DEMOCRAT FTX FOUNDER SAM BANKMAN-FRIED:
“I’m not going to rule on this now,” Kaplan said. “I’m going to give it a little more thought.”
BACKGROUND:
- In December 2022, Democrat FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas after the United States filed criminal charges against him.
- “The Bahamas and the United States have a shared interest in holding accountable all individuals associated with FTX who may have betrayed the public trust and broken the law,” Bahamas Prime Minister Philip Davis said.
- Around the same time, FTX filed for bankruptcy and Bankman-Fried stepped down from his role as CEO after the crypto trading firm imploded from a mismanagement of funds.
- The arrest came as Bankman-Fried was expected to testify before the House Financial Services Committee.
- The move came as regulators were seeking to hold individuals accountable for the multi-billion dollar collapse of FTX.
- Bankman-Fried was revealed to have donated a large amount of money to several Democratic candidates who ran in the recent midterm elections through his political action committee (PAC).
- The 30-year-old donated approximately $38 million to numerous candidates and PACs from 2021-2022, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings.
- Bankman-Fried mainly donated to left-wing causes, making the largest contribution to the ‘Protect Our Future PAC,’ a group that funded Democratic candidates.
- According to Fortune, the 30-year-old has been a “major force in Democratic politics, ranking as the party’s second-biggest individual donor in the 2021–2022 election cycle.”
