The FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried Was Arrested And Will Be Sent To The U.S
The U.S. government asked the Royal Bahamas police to arrest SBF, and they did so based on a sealed indictment.
Authorities in the Bahamas have arrested Sam Bankman-Fried at the request of the U.S. government. It happened just one day before the disgraced former CEO of FTX was supposed to testify before Congress.
The Royal Bahamas Police Force arrested Bankman-Fried after getting official word from the U.S. government that it had filed criminal charges against him, according to a December 12 statement from Ryan Pinder, the Bahamas AG and Minister of Legal Affairs.
The New York Times reported on December 12 that the charges against Bankman-Fried include wire and securities fraud, conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, and money laundering. This information came from a person who knew about the situation.
The U.S. is likely to ask for Bankman-Fried’s extradition, and Pinder said that the Bahamas would handle any extradition request “promptly.”
In a statement, Bahamian Prime Minister Philip Davis said that both countries have a shared interest in holding accountable all FTX employees who may have broken the law and betrayed the public trust.
A tweet from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York on December 12 said that Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas because of a sealed indictment that the office had filed and planned to open “in the morning.”
USA Damian Williams: Earlier this evening, Bahamian authorities arrested Samuel Bankman-Fried at the request of the U.S. Government, based on a sealed indictment filed by the SDNY. We expect to move to unseal the indictment in the morning and will have more to say at that time.
Bloomberg reported on December 10 that prosecutors from New York, FBI agents, and regulators met with FTX’s lawyers to talk about the documents that investigators want to see.
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) was “closely” looking into whether or not FTX sent hundreds of millions of dollars to the wrong places around the time the company filed for bankruptcy on November 11.
Pinder said on November 27 that the Securities Commission, the Financial Intelligence Unit, and the police’s financial crimes unit were all working on their own “active and ongoing” investigations of FTX. The authorities were also doing these investigations in the Bahamas.
Bankman-Fried was arrested the day before he was supposed to testify remotely about the collapse of the exchange before the House Committee on Financial Services.
The letter announcing the arrest from the Bahamas Attorney General
