Sam Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty on Tuesday to criminal charges that he cheated investors of his now-bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange and caused billions of dollars in losses, in what prosecutors have called an “epic” fraud.
He entered his plea in the Manhattan federal court where he faces eight criminal counts, including wire fraud and money laundering conspiracy.
The 30-year-old founder and former chief executive officer of FTX is accused of looting customers’ deposits to support his Alameda Research hedge fund, buy real estate and donate millions of dollars to political causes.
“Customer funds were also used and laundered through political donations, charitable donations and a variety of venture investments,” federal prosecutor Danielle Sassoon said at the hearing.
She suggested that the government has a deep well of evidence against Bankman-Fried, and said prosecutors will turn over hundreds of thousands of documents in coming weeks to the defense.
United States District Judge Lewis Kaplan on Tuesday set an Oct 2 date for trial, which Sassoon said could last four weeks.
The government has already secured guilty pleas from two former top associates of Bankman-Fried’s, former Alameda chief executive Caroline Ellison and former FTX chief technology officer Gary Wang.
They are cooperating with prosecutors and may testify at the trial.
A clean-shaven Bankman-Fried wore a blue suit, white shirt and dotted blue tie and carried a backpack into the courthouse, a far cry from the shorts and T-shirts that were his preferred attire when he ran FTX from the Bahamas.
He did not speak to the judge during the hearing, but conferred privately with his lawyers.
He shook hands with one of the prosecutors before the arraignment.
When it ended, he approached the handful of courtroom sketch artists and commented on their work.
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduate could face up to 115 years in prison if convicted. He previously acknowledged making mistakes at FTX but said he does not believe he has criminal liability.
SOURCE: NEWS AGENCIES