Judge Rejects Bankman-Fried’s New Trial, Cites Old Evidence

A federal judge on Tuesday denied Sam Bankman‑Fried’s request for a new trial, concluding the witnesses and evidence the former FTX CEO called “newly discovered” were known before his 2023 trial and barring the motion with prejudice.

Judge Lewis Kaplan issued the order rejecting the retrial bid. He found the three witnesses the defense cited were neither newly discovered nor likely to produce exonerating testimony and said the material had been presented to the court before and excluded as speculative or irrelevant.

The defense pointed to Daniel Chapsky, FTX’s former head of data science; Ryan Salame, an FTX executive serving a seven‑year sentence; and Nishad Singh, a former FTX executive who testified for prosecutors at trial. The defense said the witnesses would testify that FTX was illiquid rather than insolvent when it collapsed in 2022 and that Bankman‑Fried could have met customer withdrawals by selling illiquid assets.

Kaplan wrote, “In no way are these ‘facts’ never‑before‑seen, let alone newly discovered,” and said the proposed testimony was the same material the court had excluded at trial and would not justify a new trial.

Kaplan also denied a defense request to withdraw the motion without prejudice after Bankman‑Fried missed two court deadlines earlier in April. One deadline required a reply to prosecutors’ nearly 50‑page filing opposing the new‑trial motion; the other required Bankman‑Fried to confirm he was the primary author of his filings after prosecutors suggested he might be receiving outside help.

In a letter filed April 22, Bankman‑Fried described himself as the “ultimate author” of the new‑trial motion and asked to withdraw it, writing that he did not believe he would “get a fair hearing” before Kaplan. The judge wrote that if Bankman‑Fried believed the court was biased, he should not have filed the request and refused to allow withdrawal without prejudice.

Bankman‑Fried was convicted in 2023 on multiple counts of fraud and is serving a 25‑year prison sentence. He has appealed the conviction; the appeal is pending before a three‑judge panel that operates on an informal six‑month timeframe for rulings.

On appeal, defense attorney Alexandra Shapiro argued the trial was “fundamentally unfair” because jurors heard only the prosecution’s account. The outcome of that appeal will determine whether Kaplan’s order and the 2023 conviction stand.

Court filings show Chapsky signed an affidavit saying he would have been willing to testify about FTX’s liquidity but was dissuaded by his lawyers, who cited possible media attention and retaliation from prosecutors. Salame and Singh have also described reasons they did not provide the testimony the defense now cites.