Judge Denies Bankman-Fried’s Motions to Dismiss Most Criminal Charges

A federal judge has denied the motions that were looking to dismiss the majority of criminal charges against former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), court documents from 27 June show.

According to the filing, the presiding judge ruled that the arguments behind the motions to dismiss most of SBF’s criminal charges were either “moot or without merit”, and explained that dismissal of charges was upheld only in “very limited and extreme circumstances”. Filed on 8 May, the motions were looking to dismiss 10 out of the 13 criminal charges that SBF is facing, leaving only three counts of conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, securities fraud, and money laundering. Judge Lewis Kaplan explained in court that:

“Dismissal of charges ‘is an “extraordinary remedy” reserved only for extremely limited circumstances implicating fundamental rights. The Second Circuit has deemed dismissal an ‘extreme sanction’ that has been upheld ‘only in very limited and extreme circumstances,’ and should be ‘reserved for the truly extreme cases,’ ‘especially where serious criminal conduct is involved.”

SBF’s lawyers argued in one of the pretrial motions that the charges of fraud related to SBF’s use of customer assets should be dismissed as the customers did not see an “economic loss” from the alleged fraud, and that SBF was planning to pay back the accounts. Judge Kaplan said in his rejection that the defendant was “wrong both factually and as a matter of law”, and pointed to the multibillion dollar hole that Alameda Research had on its balance sheet.

Bankman-Fried’s legal team had also requested that the additional charges brought against SBF after his extradition from the Bahamas were dismissed, arguing that they were not among the original charges under which he was arrested, which violated the extradition treaty between the two countries. Kaplan rejected this motion by stating that it the Bahamian government had the right to object over possible treaty violations, not SBF’s lawyers.

Sam Bankman-Fried originally faced eight criminal charges when he was extradited to the U.S., for which he will be trialed on 2 October. Four additional charges were brought against the former FTX CEO in February 2023, and another one was added in March — when he was accused of bribing a Chinese government official — which he will face at court in March 2024.