Crypto FTX scammer Sam Bankman Fried was jailed for witness tampering.
Last week US Attorney Damian Williams sought pretrial incarceration of SBF for witness tampering:
“The defendant’s attempts to tamper with witnesses and interfere with the Government’s and public’s right to a fair trial and the due administration of justice, and his pattern of circumventing his bail conditions in that pursuit, demonstrate that no set of pretrial release conditions can adequately assure the safety of the community and that the defendant is unlikely to fully abide by any conditions of release.”
Judge Lewis Kaplan, a Clinton appointee, ordered Bankman-Fried to jail on Friday.
CNBC reported:
Sam Bankman-Fried will head to jail on Friday after a judge sided with a request by federal prosecutors to revoke the FTX founder’s bail over alleged witness tampering. Bankman-Fried will be remanded to custody directly from a court hearing in New York, where he will remain ahead of his criminal trial – which is due to begin on Oct. 2.
Judge Lewis Kaplan denied Bankman-Fried’s request for delayed detention pending an appeal.
Since his arrest in December, Bankman-Fried had been out on a $250 million bail package which requires him to remain at his parents’ Palo Alto, California house.
Bankman-Fried’s court appearance on Friday is the latest in a series of pre-trial hearings related to the ex-billionaire’s continued dealings with the press – exchanges which the Justice Department characterizes as a “pattern of witness tampering and evading his bail conditions.”