Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried seeks to dismiss most US charges against him

Former FTX CEO and founder Sam Bankman-Fried has filed a pretrial motion to dismiss 10 out of 13 charges against him, according to court documents.

Bankman-Fried is under house arrest at his parent’s house in Palo Alto, California, ahead of his expected trial in October for charges including wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to misuse customer funds.

He is also facing suits by the SEC and CFTC over similar charges, as well as the U.S. District Court for Southern District of New York for allegedly bribing Chinese officials “at least $40 million.”

In Monday’s filing, Bankman-Fried’s attorneys from law firm Cohen & Gresser seek to dismiss the conspiracy to commit wire fraud and bank fraud charges.

The lawyers also seek to dismiss a few other charges, including bribery and political contribution charges.

However, his attorneys did not appeal three charges: conspiracy to commit securities fraud, securities fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

In January, Bankman-Fried pled not guilty to eight counts of U.S. criminal charges. The decision, alongside this pretrial motion, could turn into a long legal battle.

In late December, FTX’s co-founder and former CTO Gary Wang, and Alameda Research’s CEO Caroline Ellison, both pled guilty to federal criminal charges in relation to the FTX collapse. The two are also facing civil penalties from the SEC and CFTC alongside the criminal charges.

Wang and Ellison plan to cooperate with prosecutors and will be major witnesses, given their close ties to both Bankman-Fried and FTX and its affiliated crypto hedge fund, Alameda.

Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried seeks to dismiss most US charges against him by Jacquelyn Melinek originally published on TechCrunch