Seven days after the Department of Justice revoked former FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s (SBF) bond, he now requests permission to spend five weekdays outside working with his defense team.
According to a letter sent to US District Judge Lewis Kaplan on Friday, as reported by Bloomberg, legal representatives of SBF stated that their client had difficulty reviewing the vast amount of case-related documents while incarcerated at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn.
Christian Everdell, the attorney for SBF, communicated the following statement in writing.
“Just last week the government produced three-quarters of a million pages of Slack communications, which were supposed to be produced months ago, that Mr. Bankman-Fried will have no hope of reviewing under this schedule”.
According to Everdell, granting Sam Bankman-Fried access to his legal team and enabling him to use an internet-capable laptop on courthouse grounds would expedite the proceedings. Given that his fraud trial is scheduled to begin in October, the attorney emphasized the significance of this agreement.
SBF maintains his innocence and is accused of masterminding an elaborate fraud operation involving the unauthorized use of billions of dollars in FTX customer funds for personal gain.
According to reports, prosecutors argued that Bankman-Fried should only be permitted to present this defense during the trial if he promptly provided information about the advice he received and its source.
According to reports, the prosecutors stated they could provide Bankman-Fried with information from hard drives. Individuals awaiting trial could use these devices on computers at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC).
However, due to storage limitations, not all information can be stored on a laptop. Prison authorities denied the proposal to relocate him to provide him with laptop access. Before the trial, the judge’s decision on his requests is awaited.
