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He was, for as soon as, not answerable for something however on the mercy of federal prosecutor Danielle Sassoon as she hammered him with questions on private-jet flights, his disdain for regulators and contradictions in his personal testimony.
It was a choice that he appeared to instantly remorse. Bankman-Fried dodged questions on whether or not he remembered particulars of his alleged crimes, usually opting as a substitute for “no, however I could have,” and “I don’t keep in mind.”
The statements had been on the coronary heart of Sassoon’s presentation as she showcased them to the jury, interspersed with huge quantities of proof contradicting his claims. The defendant has given prosecutors plenty of materials to work with — each on the stand and within the volumes of commentary he supplied as his enterprise rose and after it crashed.
The stakes for Bankman-Fried may hardly be larger. Authorized specialists agree he took a serious danger in deciding to testify, a raffle that steadily blows up for defendants when they’re grilled by prosecutors.
As Bankman-Fried most likely noticed it, nevertheless, he needed to make a long-shot bid to shake up the trial after authorities attorneys introduced overwhelming witness and documentary proof towards him that his personal attorneys did little to undermine, former federal prosecutors stated. And if the ex-mogul can persuade only one juror that he’s credible, he may deny prosecutors the unanimous judgment they should safe a responsible verdict.
In her cross-examination, Sassoon contrasted Bankman-Fried’s statements on social media and his appearances earlier than congressional hearings together with his personal feedback, which confirmed disdain for his colleagues in addition to for his followers.
At one level, in a textual content to his interior circle of associates, he referred to authorities regulators with a vulgarity. In one other textual content, he crudely disparaged a subset of his followers as “dumb motherf—–s” whilst he publicly courted their belief.
Sassoon zeroed in on Bankman-Fried’s hedge fund, Alameda Analysis, from which he allegedly had billions of {dollars} of FTX clients’ funds siphoned with out their information. She pressed the previous government on whether or not he directed Alameda’s dangerous enterprise investments. Bankman-Fried didn’t deny he did and conceded the bets left the corporate too weak, together with the truth that Alameda’s FTX account had particular privileges, like a $65 billion line of credit score on the platform — a singularly enormous quantity.
“I had screwed up there as effectively,” Bankman-Fried stated in response to a query about an error in Alameda’s liquidation engine.
Bankman-Fried appeared on edge as prosecutors questioned him. The defendant took on a nervous and higher-than-usual pitched tone, usually pausing for a number of seconds earlier than answering sure or no questions. Within the second half of the cross examination, he sounded sassy and at occasions dismissive.
As has turn out to be routine, Bankman-Fried pissed off Choose Lewis A. Kaplan together with his type of reply.
“Might you simply reply the query as a substitute of making an attempt to ask the query?” Kaplan stated at one level.
Authorities attorneys additionally grilled Bankman-Fried on the discrepancies between the model of occasions he described to jurors beginning Friday and the starkly totally different narrative supplied by the prosecution’s three key witnesses, all former insiders and shut buddies.
These former high executives in Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire have pleaded responsible to crimes they are saying he directed. They spent weeks describing their ex-boss because the mastermind of a scheme to defraud FTX clients, testifying that he knowingly tapped billions of {dollars} in buyer funds to pay for dangerous investments, actual property acquisitions and political contributions.
Caroline Ellison, Alameda’s former chief government and Bankman-Fried’s sometimes-romantic accomplice, testified earlier this month that he “was the one who directed us to take buyer cash to repay our loans,” including the loans had been “within the ballpark of $10 billion.”
She instructed jurors she lied repeatedly at his instruction, together with by sending deceptive stability sheets to Alameda’s lenders. And he or she stated Bankman-Fried knew for months that the buying and selling agency would face issue repaying what it took from FTX.
Against this, Bankman-Fried insisted on Friday he constantly acted in good religion and solely discovered that Alameda owed $8 billion to FTX within the month earlier than the companies collapsed. He acknowledged making errors — conceding “lots of people obtained harm” — however insisted he neither defrauded anybody nor took buyer funds.
His protection legal professional additionally tried to color Bankman-Fried as a sympathetic character to the jury, exhibiting texts the place he appeared to consolation a type of insiders-turned-witnesses, Nishad Singh, whereas FTX was collapsing.
Bankman-Fried has pleaded not responsible to seven felony counts, together with fraud and cash laundering. If convicted, the 31-year-old may spend a long time in jail. The prosecution’s cross-examination will proceed into Tuesday, Sassoon stated.
Newmyer reported from Washington.
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