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Why hasn’t Sam Bankman-Fried been arrested yet?

• bigmattystyles 4y ago
  Isn't he the very visible tip of a very embarrassing series of many recent events for the Bahamas as a business haven? Or is it the opposite - the Bahamas (or its current leaders) is going for it and embracing the Caymans style, wash your money, hide your business here model?
• simple-thoughts 4y ago
  Given the large number of heroes the USG has rapidly targeted internationally for behavior which was not illegal, illegal but morally righteous, or minor infractions, it is impossible to take nymag’s piece as anything except a placement by a USG LEO or an extremely inexperienced reporter.
• AlbertCory 4y ago
  From having been lawyer-adjacent, I have one thing to contribute: Lawyers are pathologically risk-adverse I use that adjective deliberately. Their favorite phrase is "out of an abundance of caution" which means "I can't think of any reason why I must do this, so I won't." Cynicism. But to go out on a limb and get your ass kicked by his high-priced lawyers could be career-ending for them. Or rather, their career would become "chasing ambulances."
• racked 4y ago
  Pointless article. TL;DR: Madoff confessed, SBF didn't. Investigation takes time.
• RantyDave 4y ago
  SBF? Trump had boxes full of actual "Top Secret" documents hidden at home. I guarantee that if the FBI found boxes of nuclear secrets at my house that my remaining freedom would be measured in minutes.
• russellinhustle 4y ago
  its just a big joke of what how the world works right now; he scammed worldwide users for 8B+ or more; > donated hundreds millions to US organizations and politics; > US citizen with good connections > highlighted many times that FTX US was solvent and money flowed away from international organizations > US users will get funds back; US does not press charges and probably even protect him Scam scheme of 2022: stole money worldwide, be US citizen and share some for US donations, get profit, repeat
• segmondy 4y ago
  Folks in US love to spout, "Innocent until proven guilty" until they feel victimized and they start chanting, "lock em up, right now!"
• Ekaros 4y ago
  More questions about him. If he stays free is he likely to destroy some evidence or affect the investigation somehow? And he is in Bahamas, is he likely to run anywhere from there? Does he even have capacity to attempt it? If he were to try to run he would likely end up locked up. But currently, it is kind of immaterial.
• tb_technical 4y ago
  Because he donated to the right people.
• g42gregory 4y ago
  He is a an exceedingly large donor to the establishment, especially to the party currently in charge (matters not which one). With his connections, he is in the different tier. No judgement here on whether it’s good or bad.
  • cmeacham98 4y ago
    .
    • thepasswordis 4y ago
      No, he’s in the Bahamas and yes is is a donor to the Bahamian government.
  • hash07e 4y ago
    Maybe he belongs to a small tight knit group with institutional power?
  • lavventura 4y ago
    What will happen when the party currently in charge change? Will he still be untouchable?
    • frgtpsswrdlame 4y ago
      It's been coming out that he donated lots to them too so I guess we'll see. My impression overall though is that he will end up in jail, it's just going to take a while for everyone who received his money to come to terms with the scale of his fraud.
    • mikeyouse 4y ago
      It's a dumb conspiracy in the first place -- he was a large donor to some congressional candidates, many of whom lost (over $10M of his 2022 funds went to a losing candidate in an Oregon primary). In any case, it's obvious he has zero money and zero future prospects to be politically useful so there's no reason that anyone in charge would go out of their way to "protect" him (contrary to someone like Corzine, Menendez or Rick Scott). These theories are just weird HN conspiracies to add mystique to the very normal slow Federal justice process.
• dstein9 4y ago
• mikkergp 4y ago
  "At the risk of stating the obvious, the reason Madoff was arrested so quickly is because he confessed to every element of criminal fraud — including both the underlying scheme and his criminal intent. This meant that the FBI had both that confession and highly potent, admissible evidence of guilt in the form of testimony from his adult children (who had no apparent axe to grind)." Right, I mean, I'm not saying he's not guilty, but does anyone at this point really understand it deeply enough to file an arrest warrant? I understand the impatience emotionally, but not logically.
  • HWR_14 4y ago
    Also, it's not like he's about to hop in a private jet and evade the jurisdiction. He's constrained in an extradition friendly country. And to the extent it's not extradition friendly (mostly if they want to press charges first), it doesn't help to file an arrest warrant. Speed isn't required here.
  • sidewndr46 4y ago
    Hasn't SBF given long detailed interviews about the activity of FTX & his roles there?
    • kasey_junk 4y ago
      Yes but it’s fairly complex and he keeps presenting it as a mistake and a lack of controls. He hasn’t admitted to it as fraud, which is (I’ve heard) hard to prove.
      • pierrebai 4y ago
        Spending your customer deposit that are legally off-limits, and that he said were off-limit, on things like houses, properties, etc for your own self and family is not a straight-up admission of wrong doing? Since when breaking and entering a looting a house can be defended with "well, I thought all was fine"? He admitted numerous times doing things that are straight up illegal.
• graeme 4y ago
  The biggest answer people miss is that: 1. Sam Bankman Fried is in the Bahamas 2. Sam Bankman Fried was Tether’s biggest customer and banked with Deltec, Tether’s bank 3. The attorney general of the Bahamas, the man with the power to arrest Sam, is Deltec’s former lawyer The US system is probably content to watch while Sam confesses, but they can’t directly arrest him and Sam appears to have captured the local judicial apparatus.
  • googlryas 4y ago
    You can still get a US arrest warrant even if you aren't in the US.
  • happytoexplain 4y ago
    He won't make an arrest because the subject is a former customer of a bank for which he is a former lawyer? Am I misunderstanding?
    • williamcotton 4y ago
      https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pepe-silvia https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pepe-silvia
    • boomchinolo78 4y ago
      Some people have friends
      • happytoexplain 4y ago
        Can you be more explicit? It sounds like you're being sarcastic. Are you saying they are friends (in which case, what is the point of pointing to the much weaker relationship)? Or are you saying the weaker relationship is evidence of friendship (presumably combined with the fact that he chose to go to the Bahamas)? Or something else? Edit: Whoops, I just read more of the comments and am seeing there is a tribalism angle to this. I'm not sure I want to try parsing the answers to my questions :(
    • graeme 4y ago
• insane_dreamer 4y ago
  Article provides a pretty comprehensive reply to that question. Can't wait to see SBF in jail, but it will take time.
• ppeetteerr 4y ago
  I hear a lot of people in the crypto sphere talk about regulation being a bad thing. The reality is that most regulation aims at financial institutions such as these while also protecting the consumer. Will additional regulation have a negative effect on the value of crypto? It's likely. However, the tech itself will continue to provide value to those who use it to circumvent the banking system. For instance, you can still exchange coins and store them in cold, personal wallets. The fallout of this collapse will be significant and I hope what emerges thereafter will be a more sensible approach to crypto and more stable value.
  • DennisP 4y ago
    I think what a lot of crypto people want to avoid is misguided regulation on decentralized protocols. But regulation that makes it less likely that central exchanges will rug you? I don't think many people mind that much. SBF himself was lobbying for regulations that many people claimed would have outlawed defi in the US, pushing people to use outfits like FTX instead. People certainly do object to that.
    • ppeetteerr 4y ago
      Everyone wants to avoid misguided regulation. I don't think that's unique to crypto. What I hear is more of a blanket statement that regulation of any sort is bad, which feels naive and misguided on the part of the consumer.
      • DennisP 4y ago
        Yeah I have seen that sentiment in some of the subreddits, just not in professional circles in the Ethereum community.
• iancmceachern 4y ago
  Money, and privilege.
  • iancmceachern 4y ago
    Reminder to those down voting the above comment - George Floyd was killed over $20
• oxff 4y ago
  Obviously corruption.
• soumyadeb 4y ago
  This tweet explains it all https://twitter.com/RepMaxineWaters/status/1598693811252875264?s=20&t=ggxPucSx6TSWYq15Pe4zcw https://twitter.com/RepMaxineWaters/status/15986938112528752... (For folks who don't know, Maxine is a congresswoman sitting on U.S. House Committee on Financial Services)
  • smcl 4y ago
    Yes a congresswoman is going to stand strong with some disgraced, new-money mark who donated to her, out of loyalty. Come on, get a grip
  • gjsman-1000 4y ago
    1 year ago: "We need to put reporting requirements on account flow for all bank accounts worth more than $600 to avoid billionaire corruption." Now: "SBF, would you join us for tea and coffee at a cordial executive meeting?"
    • maxbond 4y ago
      My reading is this is a very cordial invitation to hang himself under oath. If you think SBF is guilty, than you have to believe he'd be insane to "participate in a hearing." (If you think he's innocent, it's still a crazy thing to do. I'd encourage anyone who hasn't seen Don't Talk to the Police to watch it. https://youtu.be/d-7o9xYp7eE https://youtu.be/d-7o9xYp7eE )
      • soumyadeb 4y ago
        Not unless you know you will be asked about weather in the Bahamas.
        • maxbond 4y ago
          Would you bet your liberty on it? For what upside? Say Waters throws only softballs. Why wouldn't Republicans on the committee seize the opportunity to make her look foolish and compromised by throwing hardballs?
• sakopov 4y ago
  There are high-ranking government officials openly insider trading without any investigations. We have a woman who's been sentenced for sexual trafficking of minors to virtually "nobody in particular". We now have multiple massive crypto scams go completely over everyone's head because it's "internet nerd money". This complete inaction on behalf of authorities is really starting to feel like any actual wrongdoing assumed by a normal person is just a whacky conspiracy theory that gets swept under the rug because nobody is getting punished for anything when the trail seemingly leads to "the establishment" or whatever you might call it. I mean, I feel a little kooky just typing all of this out.
  • SoftTalker 4y ago
    It's always been this way. You just never knew it because it wasn't covered by the very narrow view of the world that the legacy news media presented.
    • revolvingocelot 4y ago
      No, it hasn't always been this way. The "legacy news media" itself hasn't always been this way: 40 years ago, 50 or so companies controlled 90% of American media. Now, 6 companies control 90% of American media. "This is extremely dangerous to our democracy," just like all the newscasters simultaneously say on all the different channels at once. [0] It's always been the case that Power tends to do whatever it wants, but Power is usually polite to other Powerful entities. When enough of them are at the same table, they tend to keep their elbows tucked in, but when it's too centralized people start talking about lebensraum. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZggCipbiHwE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZggCipbiHwE
    • aeternum 4y ago
      Yes, and if anyone doubts it I'd recommend "Confessions of a Wall Street Analyst". A retired analyst/trader really lays out how much insider trading there was back in the 90s even when things were supposedly regulated.
• 35amxn35 4y ago
• danso 4y ago
  Putting aside the circumstances specific to SBF/FTX (being in the Bahamas, involving crypto, SBF's political connections, etc), there's not much reason to expect that SBF should have been arrested 5-6 weeks after FTX's collapse: - Enron blew up in Dec. 2001. It wasn't until mid-July 2004 that Jeffrey Skilling and Kenneth Lay were finally arrested. - The WSJ expose on Theranos was in 2015, Holmes wasn't indicted until 2018. - Martin Shkreli's MSBM collapsed by 2012; he wasn't indicted until 2015. Bernie Madoff is a notable exception: he was arrested 3 days after his Ponzi was revealed. But it's not comparable at all to SBF's situation: Madoff was arrested after he confessed privately to his own family; his sons immediately went to the police. Whether SBF is getting exceptionally soft treatment will be easier to discern in retrospect, but it might be many months or even years before he's indicted.
  • thaumasiotes 4y ago
    > Martin Shkreli's MSBM collapsed by 2012; he wasn't indicted until 2015. This doesn't seem like a good example. The way I understood the story, Shkreli ran an effort that collapsed. Then, he ran another effort that was very successful. Then, he took money from the successful effort and used it to pay back everyone who invested in the flop. By that accounting, it doesn't really matter when the flop collapsed, because at that point he hadn't done anything wrong.
  • quickthrower2 4y ago
    Thats the whole argument of the article, of course, but still I like your comment for adding some additional interesting supporting examples.
  • Waterluvian 4y ago
    “The wheels of Justice turn slowly… but they turn.”
    • ALittleLight 4y ago
      They turn slowly for some crimes. If I was to find the prosecutor or judge who would one day be involved in indicting SBF and punch them in the face, I bet the wheels would turn pretty quick for me.
• rcurry 4y ago
  The wheels turn slowly, but grind exceedingly fine. This is a major case and it will take time for various agencies to put all the pieces together.
  • fundad 4y ago
    Yeah our institutions are taking care of everything, just wait for the rest of your life.
• spicymaki 4y ago
  If they wanted him, they would have gotten him already. This is regular every-day corruption.
• TuringNYC 4y ago
  I read the article and was puzzled by this: >> We have not seen anything like a real admission of criminal conduct from SBF yet He seems to have made many admissions, just in an "aw shucks i mixed up the money and now its all disappeared" and this seems to fall under "ignorance of the law isnt a defense of criminal behavior"
• tedunangst 4y ago
  Are there any long bets sites where I can place a bet on SBF being arrested within two years?
  • creaghpatr 4y ago
    Should be a question for Good Judgement Open, would be interested to see what superforecasters predict.
• hunterb123 4y ago
  Too busy speaking with Zelensky, Zuckerberg, Yellen, and friends. https://www.nytco.com/press/the-new-york-times-to-host-annual-dealbook-summit-on-nov-30/ https://www.nytco.com/press/the-new-york-times-to-host-annua...
• jmyeet 4y ago
  The real world doesn’t work like Law and Order. There will be an investigation before a grand jury. Evidence will be collected and a case built. Evidence and witnesses will be subpoenaed. At the end of that will come a criminal indictment (unless the grand jury declined to issue an indictment, which is rare). At that point the investigation is over. You don’t indict then build a case. Federal prosecutions don’t work that way. This is a complicated case because it involves a lot of money, a tenuous paper trail, lots of communications and several jurisdictions. SBF may need to be extradited and whatever court hears that case will need a strong case. A failure to extradite Matt effectively kill the whole case. This fraud is so egregious that the US government won’t let this stand. Stealing customer assets is as open and shut as a case gets.
• exabrial 4y ago
  Because we're a nation of laws, not a nation of knee jerk reactions and reactionary justice. This a dumb question to ask.
• fredgrott 4y ago
  That is the wrong question given the fact that VCs were involved in passing around a business template that told how to issue tokens to get around SEC governance! It's not just SBF that will be under possible arrest and jail time, expect some VCs to also be prosecuted.
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• _cs2017_ 4y ago
  Could you ELI5: what US federal crime(s) can one reasonably suspect SBF of having committed? Also, how likely is it that he will never be convicted of violating US federal laws? (For any of the numerous possible reasons: he never did anything wrong, or it's too hard to prove, or US lacks jurisdiction, or due to political connections, or prosecutors don't prioritize this type of cases, etc.)
  • stefan_ 4y ago
    Wire fraud, as always.
    • dogma1138 4y ago
      Wire fraud requires you to prove that a fraud actually took place which won’t as simple as you might think in this case. The wire part of wire fraud is easy since it involved the internet and there is plenty of evidence of communications. However the fraud part would be hard enough to present to a Grand Jury for an indictment and probably even harder to convict on especially within the given time frame.
      • _cs2017_ 4y ago
        So I'm confused. The front-page article on HN is about why SBF isn't arrested yet. So shouldn't we already have a well-thought out suspicion of what he might be guilty of? Basically, do we think this is just another financial bet gone sour (not illegal in itself)? Or do we think SBF stole something, lied about something, etc?
        • dogma1138 4y ago
          Honestly I don’t know, crypto in general is a scam in my book but I’m very well aware that doesn’t makes it illegal. Now what SBF is actually guilty of I can’t tell you, you’ll might be able to find a large number of various small violations in terms of fiduciary responsibility but I do not have the sufficient legal expertise to start unpacking this. I definitely haven’t seen anything specifically that amounts of wire fraud the closest public thing might be when they insinuated that FTX deposits are covered by FDIC insurance. Which kind of brings us to the next problem not with FTX but with crypto exchanges as a whole they don’t seem to act as only as exchanges but also as banks and investment funds. Stock, derivatives and other goods exchanges don’t tend to have customer deposits their roles is to connect between buyers and sellers and provide arbitration services to execute trades. Every time I look at crypto exchanges my brain starts to hurt and I can only think to myself how is any of this shit is even legal. Other potential issues would be the relationship between FTX and Alameda normally you will never be able to have that conflict of interests between an exchange and a market maker in any regulated equity market. I also don’t understand how or why these exchanges can issue their own tokens that would normally be equivalent to a promissory note. I honestly can’t wait until this entire crypto fab dies over but I also unfortunately don’t see people going to jail over any of this nonsenses.
• lamontcg 4y ago
  He stole enough money to be considered respectable.
• temptemptemp111 4y ago
• Animats 4y ago
  US prosecutors don't want to get an indictment until they have enough info for a conviction. If they indict prematurely, the perp may get an acquittal. They only get one shot. That's what "double jeopardy" is about. What ought to be the easy win here for prosecutors is theft, in the form of diversion of client funds. That's most likely to apply to FTX.us. Now, if FTX was registered as a "national securities exchange", or a broker/dealer, under US law, that would definitely apply. Without that, the jurisdiction issues are worse. [1] https://www.justice.gov/usao-mdtn/pr/former-mid-state-securities-broker-sentenced-federal-prison-stealing-elderly-clients https://www.justice.gov/usao-mdtn/pr/former-mid-state-securi...
  • wmf 4y ago
    They do superseding indictments all the time.
    • dogma1138 4y ago
      A superseding indictment can’t be issued once a trial has started and if it’s issued too close to a trial date it opens up a vindictive prosecution defense. Grand juries are complicated and can take a long time, if you issue an indictment too soon without having all your ducks in a row the defense can push for a fast trial knowing that the prosecution doesn’t have enough to convict or are at a weak position for a plea deal. Cases like this are especially complex since whilst it’s easy for anyone to see that something really shady has transpired one would be hard pressed to actually define which laws specifically has he actually broken. And even more so it would be even harder to gather the evidence required to indict in the first place not to mention get a conviction or a guilty plea.
• wubbert 4y ago
• bombcar 4y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33835220 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33835220 Because Madoff's lawyer says he should shut up, and he isn't, so why not play out some line and let the fish set his own hook? Arresting him would just make him clam up.
• speby 4y ago
  Short answer is, like anything in these cases, it has complications and an investigation unit is needed first in order to collect data and evidence, assess which, if any, laws were broken and file an appropriate warrant for arrest. Until that process happens, "innocent until proven guilty" applies here. Emphasis on the "proven" part as that is how our justice system is intended to be. Which also means "not fast"
• ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
  I strongly suspect it was because he didn't embarrass any really rich people. Madoff (and Holmes) embarrassed (worse than ripping off) some very influential people. Jeffrey Epstein could have really done it, but he's boating with Charon, right now...
  • PM_me_your_math 4y ago
    Holmes embarrassed the Patron Saint of Chaos. Prison is getting off light.
• black_13 4y ago
• hsbauauvhabzb 4y ago
  I’ve always imagined that piss enough people off like SBF did would increase your chances of accidentally falling down the stairs, or for it to happen to those around you (pay us first or we start on your loved ones). To be clear, I don’t wish death on SBF, but presumably at least some of the people with money are dangerous. The case of Melissa caddick in aus (stole 40m, disappeared, only her foot was found) seems similar, but currently there’s no evidence of foul play.
• scrubs 4y ago
  Complexity is an enabling friend for criminals and the incompetent. And lobbyists. The executive branch has got work with the legislative branch to eliminate ways to draw out prosecution to play for time. Second, consider this comment filed in the original article: "He hasn't been prosecuted yet because he was a major contributor to the democrat party." Another comment made reference to his alleged Jewish heritage. Beyond this unwarranted untrue generalization, there's an interesting underlying emotional component to the hypercritical hyper divide in many big stories like this: self created, self imagined victimization. When we contextualize the world this way we see ourselves as victims from which we manufacture moral outrage, virtue signaling, and even a kind of perverse machismo that one had the courage to call out the truth eg he's a democratic funder and the rules don't apply to him ...but they do to us the hardworking guys trying to do the right thing. Folks, it's a dead end. The linked article I think is much more helpful and insightful.
  • fear_and_coffee 4y ago
• scohesc 4y ago
  He hasn't been arrested yet because of one of the reasons below.: - It's easier for the government to hunt down $600+ transactions instead of trying to navigate their own obtuse, complicated tax laws - wonder if that's intentional, but that's a tangent that doesn't need to be explored - SBF donated millions of dollars to DNC causes and (SBF-admitted, which ANYBODY should take with a grain of salt since the guy's a sneaky little liar) to RNC causes. Why would politicians rush or push to prosecute someone who gave or could give them more money in the future? - SBF has family that's tied to major political movements (I believe his mom runs/works for/with a larger financing arm of the DNC). - It simply takes a long time for the evidence to be gathered, put on display, and have him sentenced/found guilty. It is _VERY_ suspicious that most media outlets are being nice and trying to whitewash this into obscurity. The dude "LOST" 1-2 billion dollars. SBF should be under witness protection, at the very least - if not jailed until trial. The facetious, compulsively lying tech bro who only says "I'm sorry" after literally stealing investors' money should quite literally be barred from seeing the light of day ever again. Not sure if SBF decided to run this racket for a self-corrupted version of "citizen justice" against a broken and unfair economic system, but he sure harmed a lot of innocent people in the crossfire if that was the intent. I wouldn't be surprised if he's able to disappear from the eyes of the public due to the always-corporately-manipulated media conglomerates.
• throwaway5959 4y ago
  Wild how if you’re caught selling weed you’re immediately arrested but if you’re caught stealing billions of dollars you get to give interviews from the beach.
• masswerk 4y ago
  > At the risk of stating the obvious, the reason Madoff was arrested so quickly is because he confessed to every element of criminal fraud… From a European perspective, this is strangely backwards: Madoff confessed and was fully cooperative, hence, there was no need to deprive him of freedoms without a process. In the SBF/FTX affair, on the other hand, there are no signs of full cooperation and there's some danger of obstruction of justice and tampering with potential evidence. (Which should be, apart from risk of recurrence and/or acute danger, the only reason for depriving anyone of granted freedoms without a due process.)
• 3lkjlkrg 4y ago
• olalonde 4y ago
  It seems that the discussions about the prosecution of SBF all assume that the U.S. will take the lead in prosecuting him, but couldn't he also face fraud charges in any of the countries where FTX operated? I hope that prosecutors in all of these countries are investigating this matter.
• kepler1 4y ago
  I am curious too. Why is SBF not being treated like a Bernie Madoff? Paper trail non existent or too complicated? It's odd how softball the NYT etc are treating him. There's a meme where they count the number of times "crime" "fraud" etc are mentioned in articles about him. Almost nil.
• bandrami 4y ago
  I thought it wasn't 100% clear that FTX ever actually claimed fiduciary responsibility?
• lvl102 4y ago
  Let me spell it out for you: white male with connections.
  • karaterobot 4y ago
    Let me remind about Bernie Madoff, another white male with connections. The article discusses the differences between Madoff and SBF, and why one got arrested immediately and the other has not. It's an interesting article, check it out!
    • deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]