Federal prosecutors have asked a judge to revoke Sam Bankman-Fried’s bond after he allegedly shared documents with the New York Times that were meant to harass a fellow executive from the FTX empire and potentially influence her testimony. The U.S. Department of Justice’s request is straightforward: It wants Bankman-Fried behind bars until his trial kicks off on Oct. 2. Bankman-Fried’s defense team says he has a First Amendment right to defend his reputation and respond to reporters. Mark Cohen, one of Bankman-Fried’s attorneys, said Bankman-Fried was merely asserting his First Amendment right to defend his reputation. Orlando Cosme, the founder and managing partner at law firm OC Advisory, said judges have a lot of discretion with issues like bond revocation. Ken White, a founding partner at Brown White and Osborn LLP, said the judge wouldn’t like a defendant trying to influence or retaliate against a witness. White said Bankman-Fried’s choice to speak to journalists and authors ahead of the trial is astoundingly dumb. The DOJ will have to be able to convince the judge that Bankman-Fried will continue harassing and intimidating witnesses or otherwise continue violating judicial orders to win its motion. Prosecutors have until tomorrow to respond to the defense filing. Cosme said prosecutors are not the type to bend to political games. White said that the campaign finance charge isn’t worth potentially violating an extradition treaty, given all of the other charges Bankman-Fried still faces. The question now is whether Bankman-Fried will go to jail ahead of his trial.
The difficulty there is ‘what is tampering?’ said one attorney with experience in white collar litigation. I would look specifically at the evidence they’re using and whether it can be viewed subjectively.
Generally people have free speech over what’s called protected speech. Intimidating witnesses is not protected speech, said Orlando Cosme, the founder and managing partner at law firm OC Advisory.
The question is how much the judge sees that as attempting to harass and influence a witness versus his lawyer saying [he’s just] putting his story out there and countering the media narrative about how terrible he is, said Ken White, a founding partner at Brown White and Osborn LLP.
He really doesn’t understand the sort of theories behind the government’s charges and what admissions by him are harmful to him, said White.