FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried's lawyer asks judge to reject 100-year recommended sentence https://t.co/Wxkkt68Ka6
— The Associated Press (@AP) February 28, 2024
One can’t say this defence is totally worthless, since it has provided some salutatory content for us plebes. Molly White, at her Citation Needed newsletter, on “I am Sam’s low-level culpability”:
Sam Bankman-Fried’s sentencing is coming up in a month. He has now formally swapped out Mark Cohen and the rest of his rather unimpressive defense team for Mukasey Young [I49]. Concerns over potential conflicts of interest stemming from their simultaneous representation of Celsius’s Alex Mashinsky have been formally acknowledged by both Bankman-Fried and Mashinsky, and both have waived the potential conflicts. It seems Mukasey Young is mostly focusing on Bankman-Fried’s sentencing, because he’s hired a separate attorney — former prosecutor Alexandra Shapiro — to focus on his inevitable post-sentence appeal.
Mukasey and team have been busy on the sentencing side of things, on February 27 filing a 100-page-long sentencing memorandum that ends with a request that Bankman-Fried be sentenced to only 63–78 months imprisonment (5½ to 6½ years). The filing contains a long rebuttal to the as-yet-unfiled pre-sentencing report, which Bankman-Fried’s legal team says recommends he serve 100 years in prison. They describe such a sentence as “grotesque” and “barbaric”, and the kind that should be reserved only for “heinous conduct” like mass murder.
The filing also contains a glowing description of Bankman-Fried, starting at his early life, with headings like “Sam Is Not Motivated By Greed,” “Sam’s Caring For Individuals”, and “Sam’s Remorse”…
A final section on “Sam’s Condition” outlines Bankman-Fried’s neurodiversity, and says that he has already been suffering in jail as a result of harassment from other inmates, poor food options as a result of his vegan diet, and the generally grim conditions of MDC Brooklyn…
Bankman-Fried’s veganism comes up… a lot. Like a lot. In this sort of “ah, well your honor, I know he committed one of the largest financial crimes in history, but have you considered that he is a vegan?” way. One fellow effective altruist and vegan, David Pearce, writes of Bankman-Fried’s veganism: “here we have a person who (literally) wouldn’t hurt a fly incarcerated in a place that wasn’t built for folk with such soft hearts”. [Footnote: He would for sure steal all a fly’s money, though.] I actually found myself looking up if Judge Lewis Kaplan is himself vegan, because it’s so (excuse my phrasing) hamfisted that I wondered if it was an attempt to appeal to a bias of his.My guess is that so many of the letter-writers are effective altruists and vegans themselves that they see it as an impeccable testament to his character, and don’t realize others don’t necessarily assign it the same moral value. That, or they realize that “vegan” is a convenient way to signal “white, wealthy, and well-connected” without having to say it. Probably both…
Jeff John Roberts, at Fortune, on “Sam Bankman-Fried’s final con game”:
If you are a 31-year-old who is charged with major crimes, the normal course of action is to take a plea deal in order to reduce the sentence, and then hope for the best before the judge. You will probably also resign yourself to spending decades in prison. Unless you are rich and connected, of course. Then you may try a different strategy.
Take Sam Bankman-Fried. Even though he faced a mountain of evidence showing he committed one of the biggest frauds in U.S. history, he chose to roll the dice on a three-week trial. For his trouble, Bankman-Fried got rung up by a jury in less than four hours. And now that he faces a maximum sentence of 100 years or more when he goes before a judge next month, he is doing something else only wealthy and entitled people can do. He is trying to spin his way out of the whole mess…
As the New York Times reported on Tuesday night, Bankman-Fried has hired “a new lawyer known for courtroom showmanship” and another high-flying attorney to work on a long-shot appeal. He also has his law professor parents—the Bay Area power couple known as “Barb and Joe” to fellow denizens of Stanford’s campus—working on legal issues, and arranging a sympathy campaign to show why everyone is wrong about the poor lad.
All of this is a “long-shot strategy orchestrated by Mr. Bankman-Fried’s family and friends to reverse his conviction and engineer a public reappraisal of his leadership at FTX.” The Times doesn’t acknowledge it is a vehicle for this strategy—as evidenced by Bankman-Fried’s team waiting for its sympathetic article to drop before filing a trove of letters and arguments in court to amplify their position. Nor does its article raise the awkward question of how the Bankman-Fried clan is paying for those gold-plated lawyers and a PR firm whose monthly retainers start at $50,000.
The likely answer is that Bankman-Fried’s parents are footing the bills with the help of $10 million they pressed him to pay his father for legal work—money that came from the treasuries of the crypto companies that collapsed under a mountain of fraud. This is bad enough but even more obnoxious when you read things like this: “His lawyers said Bankman-Fried wasn’t motivated by greed but by a desire to better the world through philanthropic giving. Material items and extravagance did nothing for him, they said.”…
All of this makes the parents’ current attempt to “engineer a public reappraisal” of their Sam so galling. They remind us at all turns how Sam should not be punished for robbing his customers because he is on the spectrum or because he has been the victim of cruel media caricatures. And so on. What they won’t say is that Sam is a 31-year-old man who grew up with every privilege in the world, and has shown every indication of being a liar and a sociopath.
You can’t fault Barb and Joe for doing all they can to protect their child. Any parent would do the same. But if they really wanted to show their love and help their son, they could—just once—stop telling Sam how special he is.
Some criminals are just incorrigible…
SBF still pushing Solana behind bars
At some point you have to respect the hustle pic.twitter.com/Qm3khgdRtM
— Morning Brew ☕️ (@MorningBrew) February 29, 2024
AlaskaReader
” …but have you considered that he is a vegan?”
Good enough for a rotating tag.
Chetan Murthy
100 years in prison, eh? Huh. I’d think that the prospect of such a sentence would be a deterrent to, y’know, committing the greatest financial fraud in our country’s history.
billcinsd
@Chetan Murthy: I think the prospect of making a billion dollars and possibly not getting caught rather obviates the possible punishment. Of course staying legal and only making hundreds of millions is just not done.
Martin
Parts of the Sierras are forecast for 10′ of snow in the next 72 hours.
sab
I have had inlaws go to prison. Nobody gave a rats ass of concern about how prison would affect their heath. That is part of the point. Prison is unhealthy. Don’t do stuff that lands you there.
ETA Family cared, but nobody gave a rats ass about family feelings either.
AlaskaReader
“When the people shall have nothing more to eat, they will eat the rich.”
__Jean Jacques Rousseau
Martin
@Chetan Murthy: Oh, that was not remotely the greatest financial fraud in the nation’s history. There’s a thousand people you’ve never heard of that did more damage back in 2007. None of them were even charged.
That failure of justice inspired a hell of a lot of the crypto dudes.
Chetan Murthy
@billcinsd: More reason to send him to the slammer for a long, long time. So that anybody else (and there are *so* many others, aren’t they? *ugh*) who thinks about trying this ….. backs out ASAP. These massive thieves need to be put down and hard, for the good of all of us, for the well-functioning of society. Property theft on this scale is society-destroying.
sab
@AlaskaReader: Rousseau didn’t have a firm grasp on reality. Rich eat, they are not eaten.
Dangerman
Fee Fi FAFO Fum
“… but have you considered that he is a vegan?”
Yes.
Next!
Chetan Murthy
@sab: Kaleif Browder comes to mind. He was innocent (the state couldn’t even begin to prove its case against him, so charges were dismissed), and yet he was thrown in to Rikers to rot.
Ruckus
@Martin:
Once, a few decades ago, had to dig out the car from an overnight snow event in Mammoth Lakes. First problem was actually finding where the car was parked the afternoon prior, because the snow was heavy enough to be about 2-3 feet over a full sized station wagon and there really wasn’t any obvious cars parked where there was only a smattering of snow the day before.
sab
@Chetan Murthy: Whenever I think that my local criminal justice system is fucked up beyond belief I contemplate NYC.
NYC really takes the cake here. How do we still think they are lefties? Their criminal justice system is appalling.
ETA My Ohio and Minnesota inlaws actually did what they were accused of. In regards to NYC justice I have my doubts that the accused were guilty.
Chetan Murthy
@sab: Did you read what TFG said about his “deportation force” ? He’s gonna bring in all the local po-po: he says they know where all the “illegals” are, they’ll go round ’em up. I can see that NYPD doing that shit: they’d all have orgasms it’d be so much fun for ’em.
Ruckus
@Chetan Murthy:
Only if you think small.
If you think that the world owes you basically everything for your bright ideas and mischievous ways to make billions that disappear into your pocket for absolutely no return then likely no, that likely wouldn’t be a thought that enters your mind. In this case, small time thinking never entered into it, around it, in the same universe.
Martin
@Ruckus: Mammoth residents had that problem with their houses last winter. This winter hasn’t been remotely as bad, but I don’t think they had this kind of a 3 day period last year. I think they got 11′ in 5 days in the worst stretch last winter.
sab
@Chetan Murthy: My family goes back almost to the Mayflower, but the last two generations married not white foreigners and they certainly improved the stock. Talented, intelligent, sensible people.
sab
OT: Our long ago adopted feral cat is not aging gracefully. Aggressive hissy fits against all the other cats all the time. She loses all those hissy battles
ETA Dobby just laughs. He thinks she is nuts.
AlaskaReader
@sab: Tell that to Marie Antoinette
sab
@AlaskaReader: I think she got things wrong.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@sab:
She thought cake was the answer to everything.
Phylllis
Number Go Up, by Zeke Faux, gives a deep dive into SBF’s ‘effective altruism’ bullshit. In other words, there’s no there there. It also provides some pretty good evidence that the parents are equally culpable.
Ruckus
@Martin:
That was a friend’s dad that lived/worked in Mammoth, we had visited numerous times, my friend lived in the same town in LA County that I did and we went to the same high school. I’ve lost touch with him years ago but I imagine that his dad is gone as this was 50+ yrs ago. I imagine that at least some people I’ve been to school with are no longer with us, and one was in jail for 53 yrs for murder and released last year. My high school years were interesting to say the least.
sab
@Phylllis: They do deserve worse than having their darling in jail.
Also too: Some educational body paid actual money to one of them to teach ethics? Really? Actually?
NotMax
Mayhaps he could convince the parents and whatever hangers-on there still may be to invest in a new delivery service: Cell Dash.
AlaskaReader
@NotMax: Hang em
AlaskaReader
@AlaskaReader: …that wasn’t the right link.
Trying again
Baud
@AlaskaReader:
Rousseau couldn’t envision modern social media
Ian R
I hate the framing of white collar crimes as not serious.
Murder would have affected far fewer people. Also, I’d be very surprised if multiple people haven’t died of starvation or exposure as a result of his crimes.
AlaskaReader
@Baud: Have to agree, most of those people on social media don’t know Rousseau or any of the context.
…also, plenty of people in denial about class war.
Then again, some question whether ‘the Terror’ was productive.
NotMax
@AlaskaReader
Also too.
;)
p.a.
@Ian R: Agreed. There have been corporate decisions made that have been in effect death sentences for whole towns and regions, and *snap* *whizz* capitalism, so, move along, nothing to see here.
Not to mention “other actors”, like, oh, let’s say refusing Medicaid expansion…
Baud
@AlaskaReader:
Surely that’s not the only option.
NotMax
@AlaskaReader
A mighty fine orchestral spaghetti western performance.
Chetan Murthy
@p.a.: Bhopal, India
AlaskaReader
@p.a.: Capitalism means never having to pay downstream costs.
AlaskaReader
@Baud: Was or wasn’t?
One thing for sure, we don’t learn from history.
AlaskaReader
@NotMax: Also: Oscar winner
NotMax
@AlaskaReader
Morricone snagged an Oscar at age 87 – 7 years older than Biden!
;)
OzarkHillbilly
@Ian R: I suspect suicide is the more common cause of death for his victims.
wjca
Marie gets a bad rap. When you bake bread without properly greasing the pan, the bread sticks to it. When you’ve pulled the bulk of the loaf out, what’s left is “cake”.
Her answer was still insensitive. But she wasn’t suggesting cake in the dessert sense that it reads to us today. It was still just bread.
lowtechcyclist
@sab:
It shouldn’t be part of the point. Prison shouldn’t be hazardous to one’s health. The removal of one’s freedom to come and go as one pleases should be the point. Rape in prison shouldn’t be considered part of the punishment, nor should inadequate diet or medical care. That it all too often is, is a travesty.
Being a vegan, OTOH, is a choice. A prison diet should be a healthy diet, but nobody should expect it to accommodate everyone’s dietary preferences. If SBF can only be a vegan in prison by starving himself, maybe he should choose differently while he’s in the slammer.
Daoud bin Daoud
“But but have you considered that he is a vegan?”
“We’ll eat him last, then.”
NotMax
@Daoud bin Daoud
Not first, as an amuse douche?
//
Baud
@lowtechcyclist:
Veganism can be for religious reasons.
Baud
@wjca:
That sounds less tasty than actual cake.
wjca
@Baud:
But more food value.
Besides, it’s French bread.
lowtechcyclist
@Baud:
A lot of things can be done for religious reasons that aren’t necessarily a requirement of that religion.
And most religions will give their followers a bye if they’re in circumstances that make it impossible to follow all religious edicts.
Manyakitty
@Baud: right. As someone who follows a religious diet (kosher), I completely agree.
This precious little egg, however, would probably complain if the vegan food wasn’t organic. Nothing is ever enough for a princeling.
Baud
@lowtechcyclist:
Federal law generally tries to accommodate religious rights of inmates regardless of whether a violation would be excusable.
But I don’t know if religion is involved here.
wjca
The family apparently worships him. Does that count?
mrmoshpotato
Has a sentencing date been set yet?
Ken
TODD: The history of the world, my sweet….
LOVETT: Save a lot of graves, do a lot of relatives favors!
TODD: Is who gets eaten, and who gets to eat!
LOVETT: And everybody shaves so there should be plenty of flavors!
TODD: How satisfying for once to know,
BOTH: That those up above will feed those down below!
JML
I’d be ok with his parents serving part of his sentence. They can each do 20 and knock his sentence down to 60 years. Give them time to think about how badly they failed as parents and helped wreck a lot of lives by supporting a massive financial fraud.
Uncle Cosmo
For a scoop of poetasty justice, how about we bundle Sham Bankster-Fraud’s vegan tush into a Crew Dragon and fire him and his adoring parents off to Vega. Perhaps after 250,000 years or so of travel time, our descendants will be there to snag the capsule, purge any organic residue, and set it up in a museum of ancient history.
SFAW
Maybe they can get him out of jail by saying he has bone spurs. Seems to work for wealthy scumbags.
ETA: Note: saying he has them. Actually having them is apparently not a requirement.
Paul in KY
@billcinsd: Go big or go…to the big house, in this case.
Paul in KY
@sab: If you’re starving, I bet a nice plump chestnut stuffed rich douchewad would really hit the spot.
Paul in KY
@JML: I’d be cool with that. I bet, though, if that was actually put to them as an option, they would decline.