The federal judge presiding over the criminal trial of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried denied his pretrial motions to have the charges against him dismissed. In his ruling, the judge stated that the founder of the exchange lacked standing to have many of these charges dismissed and that he did not meet the requirements for a dismissal under “extraordinary” circumstances. Bankman-Fried filed seven pretrial motions last month to have the majority of the accusations against her, including campaign funding, bribery, running an unregistered money transmitter, and wire fraud, dismissed. The last three of those motions were rejected by Judge Lewis Kaplan of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York following a hearing earlier this month. On Tuesday, he rejected Bankman-Fried’s requests to have the allegations against her for bank fraud, money transmission, campaign finance, bribery, wire fraud, and other types of crime dismissed. The judge’s reasoning for rejecting the remaining four pretrial motions to dismiss is outlined in a 41page memorandum that also addresses the issues of venue and whether the prosecution has shown a strong case for property rights in bringing the fraud allegations. The judge’s reasoning for rejecting the remaining four pretrial motions to dismiss is outlined in a 41page memorandum that also addresses the issues of venue and whether the prosecution has shown a strong case for property rights in bringing the fraud allegations.
“The Second Circuit has deemed dismissal an ‘extreme sanction’ that has been upheld ‘only in very limited and extreme circumstances,’ and should be ‘reserved for the truly extreme cases,’ ‘especially where serious criminal conduct is involved,” the judge wrote. Five of the 13 allegations that were presented against the former CEO of FTX were earlier seved by Judge Kaplan, who set the trial date for March 2024.