The trial of Sam Bankman-Fried was long and complicated, but the jury's deliberations weren't. After a few short hours they've already returned a guilty verdict:
The conviction cements Bankman-Fried as one of the largest financial fraudsters in history, whose victims suffered nearly $10 billion in losses after FTX misappropriated customer funds to spend lavishly on luxury real estate, investments, and “dark money” political donations, all at his direction, the jury found.
Bankman-Fried’s lawyer suggested his client will appeal the conviction. “We respect the jury’s decision. But we are very disappointed with the result,” defense attorney Mark Cohen said in a statement. “Mr. Bankman Fried maintains his innocence and will continue to vigorously fight the charges against him.”
Well, Mr. Bankman-Fried can maintain his innocence all he wants, and who knows? He might be delusional enough to actually believe it. But an appeals court won't, so it's off to the pen for SBF. Few white-collar fraudsters have ever deserved it more.
That was fast. I guess no one bought his rambling non-denials.
Gives white privilege a bad name. This is about the only good news this week so cat blogging can’t get here soon enough.
I have to wonder if he is also a t-rumpinista? Aren’t they all delusional?
I don't think so: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/10/donald-trump-sam-bankman-fried-five-billion
Will this be another one of those "the criminal is a wealthy white person, so sentencing will be a year from now" thing?
It will take a long time, but that's because it is federal, not because of his privilege. And he will likely sit in jail in the mean time - he's a flight risk who attempted to tamper with witnesses.
But federal sentencing is like a whole additional mini-trial. First the Parole Office generates a Presentence Report, which is sort of an opening bid. The prosecution and defense then respond, and then the judge figures out the guideline range and starts thinking about the various reasons folks are giving them to vary from those.
Federal enforcement moves super slowly compared to most states.
During the bezzle[1], he had access to 10-11 digits. The fact that he didn't take off on a boat to a non-extradition nation tells me he either honestly believed his own bullshit or honestly believed he was the smartest guy in the room.
A perfect example of how disastrous either of those beliefs are.
[1] https://carnegieendowment.org/chinafinancialmarkets/85179
Where were the parents? From what I read they were highly educated professors with the “proper” beliefs who enabled their son. Shame on them.
Why blame the parents for their son's bad judgement? SBF is an adult, and did his criming as an adult. There's no evidence that his parents were complicit in any of SBF's crimes. I'm sure his parents are sad and embarrassed, but there's no evidence that they did anything wrong as parents or as citizens.
That is not the opinion of the current FTX management:
https://www.npr.org/2023/10/02/1200764160/sam-bankman-fried-sbf-parents-ftx-crypto-collapse-trial-stanford-law-school
An appeals court does not adjudicated guilt or innocence. An appeal is about mistakes of legal procedure serious enough to affect the outcome of the trial.
I’m a clerk in an appellate court and I’ve also worked in criminal defense. I’d say about 90 percent of defendants insist they are innocent. Some really do believe their own nonsense, and I would guess SBF is one of these.
I have a fried who does criminal defense, typically of the street level variety. My impression is that these guys typically know that they did the deed. This is not to say that they don't have philosophical objections to the system of criminal justice, but yeah, they had the packet on them. She once had a client who she genuinely believed was innocent. She was stressed about it. The system is not set up for people like that.
I suspect that white collar criminals are more self righteous and more likely to rationalize themselves into being the victim.
I think SBF mixed the crypto currency kool aid, sold the kool aid to the world, and also drank it. I also have no doubt that SBF knew exactly what he was doing when he stole $10B from FTX customer accounts to prop up Alameda, and hoped that the "tulips" Alameda was investing in increased in value so that he could repay his FTX customers before the shit hit the fan.