Sam Bankman-Fried's lawyers file pretrial motions to dismiss most criminal charges against him, but not charges tied to securities fraud and money laundering
The motion came after the case expanded through a superseding indictment that raised the charge count to 12, while Bankman-Fried had already pleaded not guilty to the initial eight charges. By leaving securities-fraud and money-laundering counts untouched, the filing concentrated its challenge on the case's broader charging structure rather than every allegation.
Bankman-Fried's defense asks the court to remove most counts before trial, requiring prosecutors to defend the legal basis for those allegations.
Securities-fraud and money-laundering charges remain outside this motion, preserving key parts of the government's case regardless of the dismissal request.
Second-order effects
The ruling on dismissal would shape how much of the indictment prosecutors must take to trial; the later decision to try eight charges for now shows the case's trial posture could be narrower than its full charge count.
A failed motion strengthens the prosecution's ability to present a broader case, while any dismissed counts would reduce the defense's exposure and the government's theories.
Third-order effects
The case illustrates how large financial-crime prosecutions can be materially shaped by pretrial charge-selection and dismissal battles, not only by a jury's eventual verdict.
If this pattern persists, major platform-collapse cases will continue to hinge on whether prosecutors can sustain overlapping fraud, financial, and campaign-related theories through procedural review.
The trend: High-profile crypto-related prosecutions are increasingly being defined by pretrial efforts to narrow sprawling indictments into a manageable set of trial charges.
Sam Bankman-Fried has filed motions to dismiss all but three charges in the criminal case against him. The charges he is not contesting atm are: 5. Conspiracy to commit commodities fraud 6. Conspiracy to commit securities fraud and 11. Conspiracy to commit money laundering https:…
Documents on May 8 reveal that SBF's legal team is advocating for the dismissal of all charges except for three: conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Link: https://unusualwhales.com/...
There are hundreds of pages of exhibits and declarations and filings that just crossed the docket tonight. These filings represent the beginning of Sam Bankman-Fried's defense. I'll thread some interesting nuggets — but you can read them all below. https://www.courtlistener.com/ …
New tonight — Sam Bankman-Fried has begun his legal defense, filing motions to dismiss most of the charges pressed against him. Seven total pretrial motions that just posted this evening. https://twitter.com/...
Sam Bankman-Fried's team on a supposed “dark money” conspiracy to donate to Republicans through GOP mega-donor Ryan Salame. “The allegations relating to CC-2 are also self-contradictory to the point of being incomprehensible and give no notice of what is actually being alleged.” …
More details here on how the SBF team is defending the *billionaire* Democratic donor against the campaign-finance allegation. One note — they argue the money loaned to executives (Nishad Singh + Ryan Salame) was truly theirs, not Alameda's Full filing: https://storage.courtliste…
Folks, here is the first response from Sam Bankman-Fried on the campaign-finance allegation. The charges “resoundingly lack supporting factual allegations, and are premised on incoherent or contradictory allegations regarding the aims and means of the purported conspiracy.” https…
This one should be interesting. SBF is arguing that the team in charge of FTX has become a part of the prosecution team. https://storage.courtlistener.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...