Sam Bankman-Fried’s felony trial is starting this week with jury choice on Tuesday morning. SBF, the 31-year-old man behind bankrupt cryptocurrency alternate FTX, is going through seven felony fees with most sentences including as much as 110 years.

“Your shopper within the occasion of conviction may very well be a really lengthy sentence,” US District Decide Lewis Kaplan informed SBF’s attorneys in a listening to on Thursday whereas rejecting the protection’s request for a brief launch from jail. “If issues start to look bleak… possibly the time would come when he would search to flee,” Kaplan stated, in line with a Reuters article.

Bankman-Fried was beforehand below home arrest however was despatched to jail in August after his bail was revoked. Of their request for a brief launch, SBF’s attorneys stated the “case is very technical and sophisticated, and we’d like our shopper to assist us perceive the information and clarify most of the points. He alone is aware of the information that are additionally important in making ready his protection.”

Arguing that he is not a flight danger, Bankman-Fried lawyer Mark Cohen “stated there was ‘nothing within the file’ to recommend that his shopper would attempt to flee,” Reuters wrote. “He stated Bankman-Fried had voluntarily consented to extradition from the Bahamas—the place FTX was based mostly—to america after his December 2022 arrest.”

Jury choice is scheduled to start at 9:30 am ET tomorrow in US District Court docket for the Southern District of New York, positioned in Manhattan. Opening arguments within the trial are scheduled to start Wednesday.

7 fees now, 5 extra in March 2024 trial

The seven fees on this trial are wire fraud on clients of FTX, conspiracy to commit wire fraud on clients of FTX, wire fraud on lenders to Alameda Analysis, conspiracy to commit wire fraud on lenders to Alameda Analysis, conspiracy to commit securities fraud on traders in FTX, conspiracy to commit commodities fraud on clients of FTX in reference to purchases and gross sales of cryptocurrency and swaps, and conspiracy to commit cash laundering.

The 5 fees associated to wire fraud and cash laundering carry most sentences of 20 years every, whereas the 2 securities and commodities fraud fees have most sentences of 5 years every. Kaplan will decide the precise sentence if the jury convicts SBF.

It is attainable that SBF may very well be convicted, sentenced, after which get extra years tacked onto his sentence subsequent 12 months. That is as a result of the present trial does not cowl all 12 fees in opposition to him. A few of the fees have been severed and scheduled for a separate trial anticipated to start in March 2024.

The 5 further counts within the March 2024 trial are for fraud on clients of FTX in reference to the acquisition and gross sales of derivatives, securities fraud on traders in FTX, conspiracy to commit financial institution fraud, conspiracy to function an unlicensed money-transmitting enterprise, and conspiracy to violate the anti-bribery provisions of the International Corrupt Practices Act.

The indictment’s bribery cost stated the bribe’s function “was to affect and induce a number of Chinese language authorities officers to unfreeze sure Alameda buying and selling accounts containing over $1 billion in cryptocurrency, which had been frozen by Chinese language authorities.”

One cost for conspiracy to make illegal marketing campaign contributions and defraud the US Federal Election Fee was dropped.