FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s Attorneys Fire Back at Prosecutors Over Laptop Access

The state of crypto is presented by Tron connecting the world to the power of Cryptocurrency. Saba Man Fried's attorneys are firing back at prosecutors over the amount of access the FTX founder has to his defense material. Joining us now to discuss this coin des global policy and regulation. Managing editor Nick Day who is also the editor of coin desk must read absolutely 100% state of crypto newsletter. Happy Monday, Nick. Hey, Happy Monday. Good morning. Thank you. Uh So SSP F's lawyers, they want more screen time, right? Is that what's going on here? Sort of? Yeah. So this is the ongoing saga of, you know, after bank freed's bail was revoked in the middle of August. His attorneys have basically complained that he has not had the ability to access defense materials or work on his defense the way he was able to prior to being put in jail. Uh You know, a big part of this is of course the laptop access. They're saying that, you know, being able to access an internet connected laptop twice a week is insufficient. And moreover, they've been complaining, you know, for a while now that the laptop that he's, uh, you know, the internet connected laptop is extremely slow, has a very weak internet connection does not allow him to really, uh, you know, take, uh advantage of any of the resources he's supposed to be able to tap. They're also saying that he doesn't really have as much time as he's supposed to have for the air gap laptop. And, you know, what's, besides that, you know, having hard drives is not really the same as being able to, you know, build a Google Sheet and work on an online database. So they've had, you know, these complaints really, since August, they're really demanding that he be temporarily released to work on his defense ahead of trial in less than a month now. So, uh, just the same argument. So, you know, you get, you go to jail for like, you know, shoplifting sometimes in New York. I used to at least now. Now it's ok. Um, but you can go to jail for a bunch of things, selling Lucy on the street, for instance. Uh, you know, not that I've ever done that with cigarettes, but he, he, it takes a long time to go home. How come he wants to go home? He gets to go home, right? Like, is that gonna happen? Well, it depends on the judge, right. So the issue here is, you know, his bail was revoked, obviously because he was accused and the judge found that he had tried to tamper with witnesses on multiple occasions. Uh you know, the judge revoked him on public safety grounds saying that he is a, you know, threat to the community if he is allowed to remain out on bail. Um So that's kind of like where this whole thing comes from. And, you know, the defense has already appealed that decision. A three judge panel is going to take a look at that. But um with a month left, you know, it's not a lot of time for whatever's going to happen to happen. So the question now is, will the judge be persuaded by the defense's arguments or if he'll go off of the, you know, prosecution's arguments that, you know, they've bent over backwards to give him unprecedented levels of access. And, uh you know, this is a problem of his own making. Nick. I want to switch gears quickly. Here. There are new legal developments in the ripple sec battle. It feels like it's an ongoing saga here. What's the latest? Yeah. So, um, you know, as we've talked about a couple of weeks ago, the judge overseeing the case, judge Ali so tores uh ruled that the SEC could try and make a case to appeal the argument to the second circuit court of appeals. So they filed the first brief ripple filed its brief on September 1st. The SEC filed this response to the ripple brief on September 8th ie last Friday. I'm basically saying that, you know, this is a important uh important decision. An appeals court has to take a look at that. A lot of the, you know, legal requirements are met and, um, you know, we'll see what happens next. My personal guess is we might see a hearing schedule to kind of argue this, but either way the ball is now in Judge Annalisa Torres's court. All right, Nick as always such a pleasure chatting to you and getting the updates on what's going on in this crazy, crazy world. Thanks for joining the show this morning. Thank you. That was Coindesk global policy and regulation managing editor Nick Day and don't forget to sign up for the state of crypto newsletter on coindesk dot com.