Bahamas hands over FTX founder to the U.S. to face charges

NASSAU, Bahamas –

Bahamian authorities mentioned Wednesday that former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried has been extradited to the United States, the place he faces legal prices associated to the collapse of the cryptocurrency change.

Bahamas’s legal professional normal’s workplace mentioned that Bankman-Fried can be leaving for the United States later Wednesday, noting he had waived his proper to problem the extradition.

Reporters on the scene witnessed Bankman-Fried leaving a Magistrate Court in Nassau in a darkish SUV earlier Wednesday. The car was later seen arriving at a personal airfield by Nassau’s airport, from which he’s anticipated to be flown to the United States. He is because of land at Westchester County Airport in New York and can seemingly seem in entrance of a U.S. choose on Thursday.

Bahamian authorities arrested Bankman-Fried final week on the request of the U.S. authorities. U.S. prosecutors allege he performed a central position within the fast collapse of FTX and hid its issues from the general public and traders. The Securities and Exchange Commission mentioned Bankman-Fried illegally used traders’ cash to purchase actual property on behalf of himself and his household.

The 30-year-old may probably spend the remainder of his life in jail.

Bankman-Fried was denied bail Friday after a Bahamian choose dominated that he posed a flight threat. The founder and former CEO of FTX, as soon as price tens of billions of {dollars} on paper, is being held within the Bahamas’ Fox Hill jail, which has been has been cited by human rights activists as having poor sanitation and as being infested with rats and bugs.

Once he is again within the U.S., Bankman-Fried’s legal professional will have the ability to request that he be launched on bail.

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Sweet reported from Charlotte, North Carolina.