Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

371–380 of 1001 posts

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#371

Post by TillE »

StressedDev wrote: post #310
jacquesm wrote: post #147

That happened fast! I expected it to drag on for much longer. Wonder if he'll appeal.

It was fast because the US Government did a fantastic job of prosecuting him, and his defense team had an awful client. Basically, it was obvious he was guilty, and there was almost no chance his lawyers could show there was a reasonable doubt that he had not committed the crimes he was accused of.

Yeah the defense had no alternative story to offer. Before the trial they sort of hinted that Caroline Ellison was responsible for all the fraud, but they never really made that case in court, presumably because the facts didn't exist.

So it was three co-conspirators testifying and a lot of hard evidence vs SBF saying that he remembered some conversations differently, and being incredibly evasive on cross-examination. They had nothing.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#372

Post by JohnFen »

ckwalsh wrote: post #307
idlewords wrote: post #28

In under five hours! The jury was home in time for dinner. One question for legal people—why is there such a long gap between conviction and sentencing? In this case, the sentence won't be set until March of next year.

The 5 hours doesn’t surprise me. I was on the jury of a federal fraud trial with 2 defendants with 15 charges, ~30 million in losses. We were thorough and went through each count separately, including reviewing some of the evidence, and were done in maybe 8 hours spread across 2 days. We ended up with a mixed verdict: one count not guilty for both, another not guilty for one. I fully believe they were aware and commi…

> to explain that “the internet uses wires”

I wonder if they did that to avoid having to explain to the jury that wire fraud does not actually require the use of wires...

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#375

Post by xirdstl »

wmf wrote: post #128
gzer0 wrote: post #120

Interestingly, FTX made a $500 million USD investment in Anthropic; supposedly, this was made while Anthropic was valued at $4.6 billion (unconfirmed). Now, Anthropic is nearing $30 billion. Anyone know the latest on this? Is FTX going to sell that stake off to pay back the debts? [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/sam-bankman-frieds-anthropic...

It's being debated in the bankruptcy court. Some creditors want to sell it off and others want to let it ride. Because this is crypto, some people want to issue a crypto token that represents claims on the estate.

With, of course, the minters of that coin taking the majority of the claims /s

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#377

Post by akira2501 »

hintymad wrote: post #243

I was reading the trial report by Inner City Press. The AUSAs were incredibly thorough and strategic. The evidences were air-tight, the cross-examination was masterfully controlled with precision and incisiveness, and of course the closing argument was forceful. It was a great joy to read the report, as if I was watching an extended episode of The Good Fight. On the other hand, the defense was really weak, quite hand…

> The evidences were air-tight

SBF is a dumb criminal, who then screwed over everyone he abused into creating this theft. I honestly can't imagine many easier setups, less sympathetic defendants, or parades of pissed off co-workers willing to put the knife in him before he got it in them.

> SBF did not have any intention of committing a crime.

His fraud started early on, and he used the same tactic over and over again. He lied to his customers about how their funds were held, then abused them whenever any problem involving money came up in his life. Least self aware villan ever created.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted

#380

Post by harimau777 »

constantly wrote: post #244

For anyone curious, Ken White has a good and entertaining article breaking down maximum sentences in print (here, 110 years) and what people actually serve. It's worth a read: https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc... A takeaway: "1. Maximum sentences have very little relation to actual sentences in federal law. When the government quotes the maximum sentence, they are trying to scare you. When…

In some ways I can understand white collar criminals being "more evil" than murderers. As I understand it, murderers are often acting out of desperation, poverty, etc. On the other hand, it seems like a lot of white collar criminals who have everything but feel entitled to take from people who already have less than them. Although clearly the murderers did the more heinous crime.

Not trying to say that this is something I'd build a moral or legal system around. Just that emotionally I can kind of see it.

Post reply on HN