Sam Bankman-Fried's old penthouse roommate insisted on immunity before testifying because he feared he unwittingly facilitated a crime

• Sam Bankman-Fried's ex-confidant Adam Yedidia testified Wednesday at the FTX cofounder's trial.
• Yedidia insisted on immunity to testify because he was worried he may have facilitated a crime.

Before Adam Yedidia could testify against Sam Bankman-Fried at the FTX cofounder's criminal trial, he needed reassurances.

In federal court in downtown Manhattan on Wednesday, Yedidia told jurors that he insisted on getting immunity from future prosecution in order to testify about his experience working for the now-collapsed cryptocurrency trading platform FTX, where he was a software developer.

"I was concerned that as a developer at FTX I may have unwittingly written code that contributed to the commission of a crime," Yedidia said on the witness stand.

Prosecutors allege that Sam Bankman-Fried defrauded depositors and investors at FTX, the cryptocurrency exchange he once ran, in part by commingling customer funds with Alameda Research, a crypto hedge fund he also controlled.

Before Yedidia finished his testimony on Wednesday afternoon — to be continued on Thursday morning — he didn't talk about the software code he was worried about. But prosecutors say that Bankman-Fried directed employees to write computer code that would allow funds to move seamlessly between FTX and Alameda Research, allowing the firm to take FTX customer funds and use the money for risky cryptocurrency bets.

Yedidia shifted in his seat between questions, which he answered quickly and concisely. US District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who's overseeing the case, granted him immunity ahead of the trial's start earlier this week. Prosecutors asked for immunity for two witnesses in the case, according to letters filed to the court docket.

Prosecutors separately reached cooperation agreements with three executives in Bankman-Fried's orbit, including Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison and FTX cofounder Gary Wang. Prosecutors said Wang would testify by the end of the week.

While Yedidia can't be prosecuted for what he'll testify about, he said he understood he could still face criminal charges for perjury if he lies on the stand.

Yedidia was a "close friend" of Bankman-Fried for years before he ended up at FTX, he testified. The two were "close" at MIT, and met at a group house that he once described as akin to a frat house, "but replace all the alcohol with the nerdiest stuff you can imagine."

Bankman-Fried and Yedidia lived and worked together in college, he testified. In 2017, he worked at Alameda Research for two months as a trader before leaving to pursue a PhD.

In 2021, he returned to working for Bankman-Fried, this time at FTX as a software developer.

The two became roommates once again. Yedidia said he lived in a $35 million penthouse apartment in the Bahamas, which he said Alameda Research purchased at Bankman-Fried's direction. Nine employees lived there in total, he said.

Yedida said he resigned from FTX in November 2022 after he learned that Alameda Research used FTX customer funds to repay creditors.

That was the last time he saw Bankman-Fried in person, he said — until testifying at his criminal trial.

Yedidia took the stand following testimony from a former FTX customer who said he lost thousands of dollars by being unable to withdraw funds from the exchange at the time of its collapse.

Earlier Wednesday, during opening statements, prosecutors painted Bankman-Fried as a thief who stole over $10 billion from FTX customers while telling them they could access their money whenever they wanted.

The defense said Bankman-Fried is a "math nerd" who built two lucrative businesses in the span of a few years but overlooked some aspects of risk management. Bankman-Fried's fault was entrusting his executives, such as ex-girlfriend Caroline Ellison, to run the business, his attorney argued.