What happened this week represents the beginning of a complex and costly process that will proceed on multiple tracks. The one that will likely garner the most attention is the fate of Bankman-Fried himself. “An extradition package will be delivered to the Bahamian government, and there will be a legal process in the Bahamas to assess the arguments,” Sandra Hanna, who leads the securities-enforcement practice at Miller & Chevalier, told me. “If he continues to contest extradition, it could take years.”
While that process drags on, the FTX bankruptcy, civil and criminal cases, shareholder lawsuits, and possibly cases involving others at FTX or Alameda will continue to work their way through the legal system, which could stretch out over a decade or more. As more time goes by, Bankman-Fried’s disadvantages in U.S. criminal court will increase as his former colleagues and employees consider whether to coöperate with the government investigation and potentially testify against him. “I think they’re going to take a meticulous look at each and every one of these people, and, assuming that the allegations are true, a large number of these people are going to want to plead out and coöperate,” Alex Lipman, a defense lawyer and former branch chief at the S.E.C., where he worked on the Enron case, told me. “The people who are first in the door get better terms.”
Source: The Pressure Increases on Sam Bankman-Fried | The New Yorker
