SBF Tried to Influence Witness Testimony
On the 27th of January, federal prosecutors requested that U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan modify Sam Bankman-bail Fried’s conditions to include a prohibition on private communications with current and former FTX and Alameda Research employees.
The DOJ request comes after Bankman-Fried allegedly attempted to influence the future witness testimony of at least one FTX employee, identified as Ryne Miller, the current general counsel for FTX US.
“I would really love to reconnect and see if there’s a way for us to have a constructive relationship, use each other as resources when possible, or at least vet things with each other,” the DOJ’s letter quotes Bankman-Fried as saying to Miller.
Prosecutors also asked Judge Kaplan not to allow Bankman-Fried to use “any encrypted or ephemeral call or messaging application, including but not limited to Signal.”
Prosecutors stated in their letter to the court that Bankman-Fried used the Signal app to contact Miller, as well as other current and former FTX employees – whom prosecutors described as “the very people who until recently were the defendant’s underlings whom he supervised and financially compensated, and who are thus most vulnerable to intimidation” – and ask to speak with them.
Prosecutors said Bankman-message Fried’s was a thinly disguised attempt to “influence [Miller’s] potential testimony,” which they called “particularly concerning” given Miller’s first-hand knowledge of Bankman-conduct Fried’s around the time of FTX’s demise.
(With inputs from Shikha Singh)
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