Sam Bankman-Fried, founder of collapsed crypto exchange FTX, withdrew his request for a new trial because he doubted he would get a fair hearing in a letter to the judge overseeing his case.
Bankman-Fried, who is serving a 25-year prison sentence after being convicted of seven counts of fraud and conspiracy related to FTX’s 2022 collapse, said he may renew the motion once his direct appeal and a related reassignment request are decided.
The motion for a new trial was filed by his mother, Barbara Fried, saying new evidence in the case would warrant a reset.
Bankman-Fried said he wrote the motion largely himself while detained at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, with limited help.
While specifying that he is “the author of the letter” addressed to the judge, he consulted his lawyers and his parents “because it concerns them both,” he said.
“They made editorial and organizational suggestions, some of which I incorporated into the motion,” Bankman-Fried said. “They also helped me print it, since I no longer had access to a word processor. I also shared earlier versions with a New York attorney who was originally hired to represent me on the Rule 33 motion before I decided to represent myself; they had no significant input on the final motion.”
A Section 33 motion is a formal request to a federal court for a new trial based on new evidence or in the interests of justice.
The appeal is currently before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. During oral arguments in November, her attorney, Alexandra Shapiro, argued that the trial was “fundamentally unfair,” including limits on what Bankman-Fried could present to the jury.
