Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman Fried returns to court seeking new trial after FTX fraud conviction

Jailed former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried's case is back in court as he looks to get a redo after being found guilty two years ago on multiple fraud charges.

Bankman-Fried filed an appeal in September 2024 and asked for a new trial. At the time, a lawyer representing the former executive criticized New York Judge Lewis Kaplan's handling of the case and said Bankman-Fried should not have been blocked from introducing certain evidence.

The matter is now in front of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on Tuesday morning to decide the next steps. 

​​Bankman-Fried was found guilty in November 2023 by a jury in New York of all seven criminal counts of defrauding the customers, lenders, and investors of FTX. Prosecutors say Bankman-Fried orchestrated "likely the largest fraud in the last decade," making comparisons to Ponzi scheme mastermind Bernie Madoff. Hedge fund Alameda Research was instrumental to FTX, both of which were founded by Bankman-Fried. He was later sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Samson Enzer, a partner at Cahill Gordon & Reindel LLP and former federal prosecutor, said Bankman-Fried's defense faces a "steep uphill battle," but said listening to the arguments and tone of the questioning from the circuit judges will be telling.

"Of the arguments raised by SBF, the most interesting and significant to me is whether the trial court erred in limiting the evidence in support of his alleged 'presence of counsel' defense that SBF was permitted to tell the jury about, and whether any such error was harmless or would warrant a re-trial," Enzer said in an email to The Block. Bankman-Fried's lawyers had previously argued that the former CEO acted in good faith in relying on his attorneys at the exchange.

Howard Fischer, partner at Moses & Singer LLP, said appellate courts usually give district court judges considerable flexibility in how they conduct trials. Fischer was also previously senior trial counsel at the Securities and Exchange Commission.

"Unless there are multiple errors which, taken together, deprive the defendant of a fair trial, they will strain to uphold the behavior of the trial judge," Fischer said in an emailed statement. "It is not likely that the Circuit Court will reverse based on the trial judge’s conduct or comments."

If questions are sparse during the hearing and the judges only ask pro forma questions, the original decision will likely be upheld, Fischer said. 

"The attitude of the panel will also be an indication (although not determinative): do they treat the issues raised by Bankman-Fried seriously, or do they indicate by their tone that they do not?" Fischer said. 

What's next

As for next steps, Fischer said the court will issue an opinion over the course of the next several months. If there is no appeal, Bankman-Fried's parents, Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried, will push harder for a pardon, Fischer said.

His parents are looking to get their son a pardon from President Donald Trump following other attempts to pardon high-profile crypto figures — the latest being former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao. However, Bankman-Fried's pardon chances seem slim. He was one of the largest donors to the Biden campaign in 2020, donating $5.2 million to defeat Trump at the time.

Ahead of his hearing, Bankman-Fried was active on X. On Sept. 30, he wrote in a 15-page document he said that Alameda Research and FTX were "never insolvent" and that customer funds could have been repaid in full shortly after their 2022 liquidity crisis.