- Feelings about cryptocurrency may be shaping the jury in Sam Bankman-Fried's criminal trial.
- He's charged with fraud following the collapse of crypto exchange FTX.
Cryptocurrency itself isn't on trial, but strong feelings about the virtual currency may be shaping Sam Bankman-Fried's criminal trial.
During an otherwise plodding day of jury selection on Tuesday in Manhattan federal court, several prospective jurors shared some of their feelings about cryptocurrency.
Several said that they or their family members had invested in cryptocurrency in general. All of them lost money.
One potential juror, who was ultimately dismissed, said he would harbor bias in the case because he and his twin brother each experienced major financial losses after investing in cryptocurrency.
"I invested in crypto. I did lose a lot," he said. "My twin brother invested even more and it did finally ruin him."
Another potential juror said he believed he harbored a bias in the case because of "everything negative" he's heard about the tokens.
"I'm not sure I could be totally unbiased about crypto given the history and everything negative I've heard about it," he told US District Judge Lewis Kaplan on Tuesday afternoon.
Strong feelings about cryptocurrency, Kaplan explained, weren't relevant in the case. Prosecutors allege that former billionaire Bankman-Fried defrauded customers and investors of FTX, a cryptocurrency exchange he ran. He did this by commingling funds with Alameda Research, a cryptocurrency hedge fund he also controlled, they say.
Jurors, Kaplan said, would be tasked with determining whether Bankman-Fried's actions fell into the legal parameters of fraud.
After that man said he believed he would be biased — and explained that he had just started a new job and is supposed to be the best man at an upcoming wedding — Kaplan dismissed him from the case.
Lawyers and Kaplan must choose 12 jurors and six alternates for the trial, which is scheduled to last six weeks. They whittled the group of around 170 down to about 50 eligble jurors, which would be narrowed to 18 on Wednesday morning, before opening statements.
Familiarity with cryptocurrency, the dramatic collapse of FTX, or Bankman-Fried's case specifically isn't necessarily disqualifying to be a juror. Several prospective ones had said they'd learned about the case through news publications and podcasts. None said they were a customer or lender with FTX or Alameda Research.
Another prospective juror said she worked at the private equity firm Insight Partners, which she said lost money from investing in FTX.
But she didn't have any personal dealings with the company and could be impartial in the case by deciding "on the basis of the facts," she said. Kaplan didn't immediately dismiss her from the jury pool, but did before the end of the day.
(A spokeswoman for Insight Partners told Insider that the company had made a small investment in FTX and never held a position Alameda Research.)
A different potential juror said he doesn't "understand the cryptocurrency, how it works," even after asking his son to explain it to him.
"You probably have a lot of company in this courtroom," Kaplan dryly responded.
After he said "all I can think of is the Madoff case," that prospective juror was dismissed.
Other jurors raised different concerns. One prospective juror said she would have a problem rendering a guilty verdict if Bankman-Fried faced the death penalty.
The trial is not, Kaplan assured her, a death penalty case. She appeared comforted to learn that.
Kaplan did not mention that Bankman-Fried faces a potential — if unlikely — sentence of over 100 years.
This story was updated to include a comment from a spokeswoman for Insight Partners.