Sam Bankman-Fried will get one day in court to meet with lawyers

Sam Bankman-Fried will get one day in court to meet with lawyers

Aug 21. 2023

By Turner Wright

According to a judge's order, SBF will be allowed access to one laptop and “WiFi device” for roughly seven hours while meeting with counsel in a courthouse cell block attorney room.

A federal judge overseeing former FTX CEO Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried’s criminal case has issued an order allowing Sam Bankman-Fried to meet with his legal team outside of jail for roughly seven hours.

In an Aug. 21 filing of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, Judge Lewis Kaplan ruled that SBF will be allowed to meet with his counsel in the cell block attorney room at the courthouse on Aug. 22 regarding one of his scheduled hearings. Kaplan ordered SBF’s bail revoked on Aug. 11, sending the former FTX CEO to the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, likely until the conclusion of his criminal trials.

According to the order, SBF will be allowed access to “one Internet-enabled laptop and one WiFi device” from roughly 8:30 AM EST until 3:00 PM while meeting with counsel. His lawyers had petitioned the court to release SBF for five days every week through his trials in order for him to prepare for the case. However, Kaplan’s order suggested only a one-time release within the confines of the courthouse on Aug. 22, with another decision likely pending based on a response from the U.S. Department of Justice.