Bankman-Fried Appeals His Conviction of 25 Years in Prison

Key Points:

• The former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried appeals his conviction, claiming bias and procedural errors by Judge Lewis Kaplan.
• Bankman-Fried was convicted of orchestrating an $8 billion fraud scheme and sentenced to 25 years in prison.

According to The New York Times, Sam Bankman-Fried, the former CEO of FTX, has filed an appeal against his conviction on charges that he engineered a scheme to defraud investors of about $8 billion.

Read more: Bankman-Fried Memo Reveals His Cunning During FTX Crisis

Bankman-Fried Appeals Fraud Conviction, Alleging Judicial Bias

The Bankman-Fried appeal, filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, targets the conduct of Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, who presided over Bankman-Fried‘s trial in New York last year.

His lawyers, led by his attorney Alexandra Shapiro, scolded Judge Kaplan for allegedly displaying partiality against her client throughout the trial. Shapiro argued that Kaplan had unfairly influenced the jury through his behaviour and that he had given inducements to the jury to accelerate the pace of its deliberation. The jury needed only one night to find him guilty.

Shapiro also argued that the court excluded crucial evidence that changed the case outcome. Firstly, Shapiro said Bankman-Fried was not allowed to prove that FTX and its sister company, Alameda Research, were solvent. Besides this, the court refused to allow the defence an opportunity to assert that Bankman-Fried relied on legal advice during his business.

Fights Over FTX Collapse Heat Up

Bankman-Fried was convicted in November of seven counts, including fraud, conspiracy and money laundering. Prosecutors called him the mastermind of one of the decade’s largest financial scams, likening his operation to Bernie Madoff’s notorious Ponzi scheme. Judge Kaplan sentenced him to 25 years in prison in March.

The former FTX CEO has maintained that he never intended to misappropriate funds or lie to investors. Bankman-Fried appeal represents the latest step in the four-month fight against his conviction, part of the continuing legal aftermath from FTX’s collapse almost two years ago.

Other major figures in the FTX affair were likewise charged with the law, including former Alameda CEO Caroline Ellison. Ellison, who signed a plea deal, is seeking supervised release. Ryan Salame, another FTX executive, remains embroiled in campaign finance investigations.