On Thursday, there was pushback from the New York Times against the restrictions in the criminal trial of Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of the FTX crypto exchange.
The restrictions would impose limitations on the ability of the participants to speak to the media.
The letter
The newspaper submitted a letter to Lewis Kaplan, the US District Court Judge overseeing the case, in which it talked about the public’s right to know.
It said that people need to know about the FTX scandal because it wiped out billions of dollars from the economy and numerous members of the public suffered because of it.
Citing the First Amendment, the newspaper said that it protects the right of news organizations when it comes to receiving information.
It also talked about criminal rules dictating that restrictions on the ability of non-lawyers to speak to the press should only be applicable in limited situations.
The controversy
FTX had been one of the top crypto exchanges in the market before it collapsed last year in November and its downfall has resulted in lots of questions being asked about the handling of customer funds.
It was not long after that Bankman-Fried was arrested and he is now facing a number of charges in the role he played in the exchange’s collapse, both criminal and civil, including money laundering and fraud.
The message from the Gray Lady to the judge comes after it was a report published by the newspaper that put Bankman-Fried’s bail in jeopardy.
The article that the Times published included snippets from the diary of Caroline Ellison, the former CEO of Alameda Research, and this prompted an order of review of the conditions of the FTX co-founder.
The in-depth look into the final days of Ellison as the head of Alameda showed how she did not feel capable of her position. She admitted that she was struggling with her leadership role.
The federal prosecutors
After the article was published, the federal prosecutors claimed that Bankman-Fried was engaging in witness tampering when he shared Ellison’s diary snippets in the media.
They requested the judge to put the former FTX CEO in jail before his trial begins in October, but his counsel argued that the basis for revoking his bail was very thin.
Danielle Sassoon, the federal prosecutor, also revealed that there had been about 1,000 phone calls between Sam Bankman-Fried and journalists.
At the conclusion of the hearing, an interim gag order was imposed by Judge Kaplan that prevents Bankman-Fried from making comments publicly.
On Thursday, the Times stated that restricting the statements of the participants of the trial to only those they make for defending themselves is against the standards that have been established.
It also noted that it was not until the public lost money that law enforcement and regulators became aware of the alleged mismanagement at FTX.
Therefore, the public has a lot of interest in the Sam Bankman-Fried case and is interested in knowing more about his inner circle.