{"id":1948314,"date":"2023-06-15T16:07:14","date_gmt":"2023-06-15T20:07:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/judge-throws-cold-water-on-dem-megadonor-sbfs-push-to-dismiss-charges\/"},"modified":"2023-06-15T16:07:14","modified_gmt":"2023-06-15T20:07:14","slug":"judge-throws-cold-water-on-dem-megadonor-sbfs-push-to-dismiss-charges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/judge-throws-cold-water-on-dem-megadonor-sbfs-push-to-dismiss-charges\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge Throws Cold Water on Dem Megadonor SBF&#8217;s Push To Dismiss Charges"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">24<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fjudge-throws-cold-water-on-dem-megadonor-sbfs-push-to-dismiss-charges%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1948314&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div>\n<figure><figcaption> \t\t\t\tFormer FTX Chief Executive Sam Bankman-Fried, who faces fraud charges over the collapse of the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange, reacts on the day of a hearing at Manhattan federal court in New York City, U.S. January 3, 2023. REUTERS\/Eduardo Munoz\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div>\n<p>NEW YORK\u2014A U.S. judge on Thursday appeared skeptical of Sam Bankman-Fried&#8217;s push to significantly cut back the government&#8217;s criminal case accusing the former billionaire of defrauding consumers of FTX, the now-bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange he once ran.\t<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/winred.tomcotton.com\/tom-cotton\/defend-scotus-ads-beacon?utm_source=rc&#038;utm_medium=beaconads&#038;utm_campaign=2023maybeaconscotus\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> \t\t\t\t \t\t\t<\/a> \t\t<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/winred.tomcotton.com\/tom-cotton\/defend-scotus-ads-beacon?utm_source=rc&#038;utm_medium=beaconads&#038;utm_campaign=2023maybeaconscotus\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> \t\t\t\t \t\t\t<\/a> \t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan expressed his concerns at a hearing where Bankman-Fried&#8217;s lawyers sought to dismiss at least 11 of 13 charges their client faces.<\/p>\n<p>Bankman-Fried, 31, pleaded not guilty in March to fraud, money laundering, campaign finance, and conspiracy charges following his December extradition from the Bahamas, where FTX had been based before its November collapse.<\/p>\n<p>He had asked Kaplan to dismiss six of the 13 charges because the Caribbean country did not consent, and five more because they rested on an invalid legal theory. An Oct. 2 trial is scheduled.<\/p>\n<p>Bankman-Fried is <a href=\"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/democrats\/dem-megadonor-sbf-charged-with-donor-fraud-in-new-indictment\/\">accused<\/a> of making more than 300 illegal political donations, using straw donors to direct corporate funds to campaign committees while bypassing contribution limits. More than 95 percent of Bankman-Fried&#8217;s contributions went to Democrats and Democratic committees, the <em>Washington Free Beacon<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/democrats\/bankman-fried-and-cronies-gave-300k-to-house-committee-members-investigating-him\/\">reported<\/a>. The crypto CEO and his cofounders at FTX gave more than $300,000 to members of the House committee that investigated the company&#8217;s collapse.<\/p>\n<p>At Thursday&#8217;s hearing, Kaplan declined to rule on prosecutors&#8217; request to schedule a second trial in early 2024 on five charges that Bankman-Fried said required the Bahamas&#8217; consent, saying it was uncertain when the Bahamas might grant it.<\/p>\n<p>The judge also said Bankman-Fried appeared to lack standing to invoke an extradition treaty between the two countries to get those charges\u2014including bank fraud and bribing Chinese officials\u2014dismissed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;You have a major problem,&#8221; Kaplan told Mark Cohen, one of Bankman-Fried&#8217;s lawyers. &#8220;Whatever the Bahamas&#8217; complaints about the United States may or may not be, the question is whether your client has any right to raise them.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Bankman-Fried&#8217;s original eight-count indictment accused him of stealing billions of dollars from FTX customers to plug losses at his crypto-focused Alameda Research hedge fund, and of lying to investors and lenders.<\/p>\n<p>The defendant&#8217;s lawyers said some of those charges and a newer bank fraud charge should be dismissed because they rested on a theory that the U.S. Supreme Court declared invalid last month.<\/p>\n<p>The &#8220;right to control&#8221; theory allows a defendant to be guilty of fraud for depriving someone of economically valuable information, not just tangible property.<\/p>\n<p>Prosecutors have said their charges did not rely on that theory because Bankman-Fried schemed to take his victims&#8217; money.<\/p>\n<p>Christian Everdell, another lawyer for Bankman-Fried, said the bank fraud charge accused his client of providing misleading information to a bank so it would open an account for him, not so that he could steal.<\/p>\n<p>Kaplan said the account appeared to be part of Bankman-Fried&#8217;s broader alleged scheme.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He allegedly did it for the purpose of getting his hands on the customer funds for the benefit of Alameda and himself,&#8221; the judge said, raising his voice.<\/p>\n<p>Separately, Kaplan denied Bankman-Fried&#8217;s request to force prosecutors to review some of FTX&#8217;s files.<\/p>\n<p>Bankman-Fried had wanted a declaration that FTX&#8217;s current leadership was part of the &#8220;prosecution team,&#8221; which would force the company to turn over documents for his defense.\t<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/winred.tomcotton.com\/tom-cotton\/defend-scotus-ads-beacon?utm_source=rc&#038;utm_medium=beaconads&#038;utm_campaign=2023maybeaconscotus\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> \t\t\t\t \t\t\t<\/a> \t\t<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/winred.tomcotton.com\/tom-cotton\/defend-scotus-ads-beacon?utm_source=rc&#038;utm_medium=beaconads&#038;utm_campaign=2023maybeaconscotus\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> \t\t\t\t \t\t\t<\/a> \t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>(Reporting by Abinaya Vijayaraghavan in Bengaluru and by Luc Cohen in New York; editing by Jason Neely, Elaine Hardcastle and Jonathan Oatis)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Former FTX Chief Executive Sam Bankman-Fried, who faces fraud charges over the collapse of the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange, reacts on the day of a hearing at Manhattan federal court in New York City, U.S. January 3, 2023. REUTERS\/Eduardo Munoz NEW YORK\u2014A U.S. judge on Thursday appeared skeptical of Sam Bankman-Fried&#8217;s push to significantly cut back<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":2181687,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/2023-01-03T200904Z_3_LYNXMPEJ020J1_RTROPTP_4_FINTECH-CRYPTO-FTX-PLEA-scaled.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1948314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/2023-01-03T200904Z_3_LYNXMPEJ020J1_RTROPTP_4_FINTECH-CRYPTO-FTX-PLEA-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1948314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1948314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1948314\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2181687"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1948314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1948314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1948314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}