Former FTX CEO Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried, facing a 25-year prison sentence, has requested to remain incarcerated in the New York City area instead of California.
Legal Motion for Incarceration Location
In a filing on April 8 in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, Bankman-Fried’s legal team sought approval from Judge Lewis Kaplan to allow him to stay at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, where he has been since August 2023. The request was made to “facilitate access to his appellate counsel” for his expected appeal of his conviction and sentencing.
Appeal Plans and Sentencing Details
Before Judge Kaplan announced the 25-year sentence on March 28, Bankman-Fried’s attorney, Marc Mukasey, stated intentions to appeal SBF’s conviction on seven felony counts. As of publication, no filing had been made in the online portal for the U.S. Court Of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Some legal experts speculate that Bankman-Fried could see a reduction in his prison time based on good behavior.
Initially, Judge Kaplan had ruled that Bankman-Fried would serve his sentence at a medium- or low-security prison in the San Francisco Bay Area, possibly due to family proximity. Before his bail was revoked in August 2023, Bankman-Fried had been primarily confined to his parent’s home near Stanford University in California.
Legal Proceedings and Co-Defendants
Bankman-Fried stood out as one of the few individuals associated with the collapse of FTX and Alameda Research to plead not guilty and face a jury trial. Meanwhile, Caroline Ellison, Gary Wang, Nishad Singh, and Ryan Salame—others linked to the crypto firms charged in the same case—pleaded guilty and reached deals.
Salame is set to be sentenced on May 28, while the sentencing dates for Wang, Ellison, and Singh remain unclear. Changpeng Zhao, who pleaded guilty to one felony count in a case involving cryptocurrency exchange Binance, is scheduled for sentencing on April 30.
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