The Department of Justice under President Joe Biden has decided to dismiss another lawsuit against Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of FTX and a prominent Democratic donor. Prosecutors have announced that they will not proceed with a second trial against Bankman-Fried, who previously served as the CEO of a fraudulent cryptocurrency exchange.
Notably, Bankman-Fried was a significant contributor to the Democratic Party and supported both Biden and the party during the 2020 and 2022 election periods, ranking just below the well-known liberal billionaire George Soros.
The AP reports:
“A second trial of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried on charges not in the cryptocurrency fraud case presented to a jury that convicted him in November is not necessary, prosecutors told a judge Friday.”
CNBC reports:
“Bankman-Fried, the 31-year old son of two Stanford legal scholars and graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was convicted of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud against FTX customers and against Alameda Research lenders, conspiracy to commit securities fraud and conspiracy to commit commodities fraud against FTX investors, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.”
After the downfall of FTX and Alameda, the subsequent step is the commencement of the sentencing phase for the case. Bankman-Fried, on the other hand, is confronted with the possibility of being imprisoned for over a century. Meanwhile, there is a query regarding whether the prosecution will proceed with a second case against Bankman-Fried. The Associate Press provides an explanation for the contemplation of a second trial.
“Last spring, prosecutors withdrew some charges they had brought against Bankman-Fried because the charges had not been approved as part of his extradition from the Bahamas in December 2022.
“They said the charges could be brought at a second trial to occur sometime in 2024.”
The outlet goes on to report that “the charges that were temporarily dropped included conspiracy to make unlawful campaign contributions, conspiracy to bribe foreign officials, and two other conspiracy counts. He also was charged with securities fraud and commodities fraud.”
The prosecution, nonetheless, has chosen to abandon the pursuit of a second trial due to their lack of substantial new evidence to present before the court.
CNBC reports:
“In a note to Judge Lewis Kaplan on Friday, the U.S. government explained that the decision to forego a second set of proceedings had to do with the fact that much of the evidence that would have been presented in a second trial had already been submitted to the Court during Bankman-Fried’s first criminal trial.”
Instead, Kaplan has been requested by the prosecution to take into account the evidence that would have been presented at the second trial when determining the appropriate sentence for Bankman-Fried. The sentencing for Bankman-Fried is currently set for March 28, 2024, as per Kaplan’s schedule.
