Sam Bankman-Fried, the once-upon-a-time crypto big shot, got found guilty on Thursday for tricking folks and investors out of a whopping $10 billion, at least.
A Manhattan jury laid down the law and didn't buy his denial, according to The Associated Press.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon dropped the mic, saying, "His shady moves finally caught up with him. He's been outed for his wrongdoings."
But his attorney, Mark Cohen, in his closing arguments, called out the prosecutors for painting him as a bad guy, as per the AP. He said, "It's totally off-base and unfair. I believe you've seen it's all just a load of baloney. According to the government, everything Sam did or said was deceitful."
Back in December, they hit Bankman-Fried with eight counts, including wire fraud, conspiracy, and campaign finance violations.
The Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission accused the 31-year-old crypto bigwig of raising over $1.8 billion from investors for his now-failed FTX crypto exchange while sneaking their cash over to his private hedge fund, Alameda Research LLC. He said "not guilty" in January.
In a revised indictment from March, it's said that Bankman-Fried sent around $40 million in crypto bribes to Chinese officials to get his frozen accounts unfrozen.
This dude had once shot up to billionaire status, making FTX a big deal even during the Super Bowl, with Larry David from "Curb Your Enthusiasm" in the ad. By the way, Larry got sued for that.
Bankman-Fried was all about rubbing elbows with Capitol Hill, greasing palms with political donations, and being all for the feds regulating his crypto world.
He even talked the talk in front of the House Financial Services Committee and the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry. He was all set to show up for a congressional hearing right after they busted him, talking about FTX's fall in November 2022.
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