Ms. Ellison, 28, took the stand for about four hours on the fifth day of Mr. Bankman-Fried’s fraud trial in federal court. She began by taking more than 10 seconds to identify Mr. Bankman-Fried when a prosecutor asked her to point him out.
Then within the first 15 minutes of her testimony, Ms. Ellison repeatedly blamed Mr. Bankman-Fried, 31, for crimes that led to FTX’s implosion. She testified that he instructed her to use FTX customer deposits to finance venture investments and loan repayments by Alameda Research, a crypto hedge fund that she oversaw for him. She said Alameda took around $14 billion, only some of which it was able to repay.
“He directed me to commit these crimes,” Ms. Ellison said, as Mr. Bankman-Fried sat across the room flanked by his lawyers.
Source: Caroline Ellison Testifies Against Sam Bankman-Fried, Blaming Him for Crimes – The New York Times
