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Topics: Crime, News, Cryptocurrency
Stewart Perrie
Topics: Crime, News, Cryptocurrency
Sam Bankman-Fried has been denied bail after the FTX founder begged to be kept out jail.
The former cryptocurrency king fronted a court in The Bahamas after being arrested earlier this week.
CoinDesk and the Daily Mail reports Bankman-Fried's lawyer tried to get him out on bail while he awaits another hearing.
Jerome Roberts reportedly argued the 30-year-old needed to be out of prison so that he could regularly take his medication and maintain his vegan diet.
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CoinDesk claimed Bankman-Fried testified that he takes over-the-counter allergy pills, Adderall, and Emsam patches for depression every day.
The lawyers proposed a monetary surety to get the bail and even have the defendant wear an ankle bracelet to allay fears of him being a flight risk.
Judge Joyann Ferguson-Pratt asked how much money Bankman-Fried would be willing to put up.
Roberts, said: "I hope Mr. Bankman-Fried doesn't crucify me for saying this.
"But given the circumstances, perhaps $250,000? But your honor doesn't have to agree with me. If $50,000 is a good figure, then $50,000 is a good figure."
Prosecutors feared he could disappear if he was granted bail, even though the former crypto mogul already had his passport confiscated when he was arrested.
However, Judge Joyann Ferguson-Pratt rejected the idea that just because he doesn't have a travel document does not mean he's not a flight risk
"If you sat where I sit, with the number of bail violations that come before me, you would understand [my concerns]," she said (via CoinDesk).
The judge eventually rejected the bail request and set a date for an extradition hearing next year in February.
Prosecutors in the US unsealed an indictment on Tuesday (December 13) that revealed authorities in America are charging the former FTX boss with wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering and campaign violation allegations, and other offences.
US Attorney Damian Williams spoke about the unsealing of the indictment, saying: "One month ago FTX, one of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchanges, collapsed, destroying billions of dollars in customer value, and for every day of the past month, the dedicated prosecutors of this office and our partners [in the] FBI, [Securities and Exchange Commission] and [Commodity Futures Trading Commission] have been working around the clock to figure out what happened and to begin the process of seeking justice.
"This morning, we unsealed an eight-count indictment charging Samuel Bankman-Fried, FTX's founder, with a series of interrelated fraud schemes that contributed to FTX's collapse."
The former cryptocurrency billionaire has been accused of 'betraying the public trust' after the digital coin exchange collapsed.
FTX failed in the cryptocurrency version of a bank run, which is when customers tried to withdraw their assets all at once because of growing doubts about the financial strength of the company.
Since its collapse, FTX's new management has called the cryptocurrency exchange's management a 'complete failure of corporate controls'.