Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried is expected to appear in court in the Bahamas on Monday to overturn his opposition to extradition to the United States, where he faces fraud charges, a person familiar with the matter said on Saturday.
Sam Bankman-Fried, center, is escorted out of the District Court building a day after his arrest in Nassau, Bahamas.Credit:Associated Press
The 30-year-old cryptocurrency tycoon was indicted Tuesday in Manhattan federal court and accused of participating in a scheme to defraud FTX clients.
His decision to grant extradition will pave the way for him to appear in a U.S. court on charges of using billions of dollars in stolen client deposits to pay fees and debts and invest on behalf of his crypto hedge fund, Alameda Research. limited liability company.
Defense attorney Zachary Margulis-Ohnuma said Bankman-Fried will likely be held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn upon his arrival in the United States, although some federal defendants are being held in prisons outside New York City because the facility is overcrowded.
At the first court hearing in Manhattan, Bankman-Fried will be asked to plead guilty and a judge will decide whether to release him on bail, Margulis-Ohnuma said. Such a hearing would have to take place within 48 hours of Bankman-Fried’s arrival in the United States, although it could be earlier, the lawyer added.
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Prosecutors are likely to argue that Bankman-Fried is a flight risk and should remain in custody because of the large sums of money involved in the case and the whereabouts of those funds are unknown.
“The missing money gives prosecutors good reason to think he’s a flight risk,” said Michael Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor and white-collar defense attorney. conditions of.”
Any trial could take more than a year, legal experts told Reuters.
