Disgraced cryptocurrency genius Sam Bankman Freed was sentenced Thursday to 25 years in prison after being found guilty in one of the largest financial fraud cases in history.
U.S. prosecutors came forward after a New York jury convicted Bankman Fried, known by his initials SBF, in November after a five-week trial investigating the spectacular downfall of the former high roller. Authorities had asked for a sentence of 40 to 50 years in prison.
“I'm sorry for what happened every step of the way, and there are things I should have done and things I shouldn't have done,” Bankman Fried told the court during the hearing.
The final sentence was handed down by U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who used the hearing to carefully examine the financial crimes committed by Bankman Freed.
Now that the sentence has been handed down, Bankman Freed is expected to appeal the conviction.
A New York jury convicted Bankman Freed in November after a lengthy trial investigating his shocking fall from grace.
The government's sentencing request says Bankman Fried's seven convictions reflect his “unparalleled greed and arrogance” and takes into account fraud charges estimated at more than $10 billion. He is advocating for a significant prison sentence.
Additionally, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams argued that a long sentence was necessary to “protect the public,” and characterized Bankman-Freed as a “skilled” spin doctor capable of further fraud. I attached it.
Bankman Freed's lawyers called the government's proposed sentence “barbaric” and described their client as a hard-working young man motivated by philanthropy who went above and beyond. .
Their portrayal is similar to the defense's portrayal presented by the SBF at trial, but it was quickly rejected by jurors after just five hours of deliberations.
Bankman Freed's attorneys, led by Mark Mukasey, are seeking a six-year sentence, saying the sentence would “quickly restore Sam to a productive role in society.”
-FTX implosion-
Bankman Fried, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduate who became a billionaire before he was 30, has conquered the world of cryptocurrencies at breakneck speed, building the small startup he co-founded in 2019, FTX, into a global It has grown into the second largest exchange platform.
But in November 2022, the FTX empire panicked when it learned that some of the funds stored at the company were being used in risky operations at Bankman Fried's personal hedge fund, Alameda Research. It collapsed because it could not handle the large number of withdrawal requests from customers.
During the trial, several of Bankman Fried's aides said he was key in all the decisions that led to the disappearance of $8 billion from FTX.
The group also includes Caroline Ellison, Alameda's former CEO and Bankman Freed's on-and-off girlfriend, who said Alameda received “approximately $14 billion” from FTX customers. and that Bankman Freed “instructed me to commit those crimes.” ”
Filings from the prosecution and defense paint a starkly different picture of Bankman Fried, the son of two well-regarded Stanford law professors.
“The lack of remorse is infuriating,'' Williams said, challenging the defense's image of Bankman-Freed as “selfless'' and “altruistic'' and insisting that Bankman-Freed was involved in “luxury'' real estate and society. It was pointed out that the funds had been used for donations. Interactions with political leaders, Super Bowl TV ads, and “access to celebrities.”
A defense statement said Bankman Fried was “devastated” by remorse for the FTX implosion.
～Collected funds～
Bankman Fried's lawyers also pointed to statements from FTX's current management expressing confidence that FTX's customers and creditors will recover their funds, and wrote in a prepared statement that “there will be no harm to customers, lenders, or investors.” is zero,” he said.
FTX Trading CEO John Rea issued a scathing response to the allegations, saying that continued recovery of ill-gotten gains does not make up for wrongdoing.
“The fact that what he stole…was successfully recovered through the efforts of a dedicated group of professionals does not mean that it was not stolen,” Ray wrote to the court. I mentioned it in the.
“What that means is we got some of them back.”
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