--- title: "Judge Warns Sam Bankman-Fried He’s Facing a “Very Long Sentence”" description: "Disgraced crypto scion Sam Bankman-Fried's fraud trial is about to start heating up — and the judge has a stark warning for the FTX founder." date: "2023-09-29" modified: "2023-09-29" authors: - name: "Noor Al-Sibai" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/nooralsibai" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/sbf-very-long-sentence" categories: - "Blockchain" - "Future Society" tags: - "fraud" - "ftx" - "sbf" - "the digest" --- # Judge Warns Sam Bankman-Fried He’s Facing a “Very Long Sentence” ![Disgraced crypto scion Sam Bankman-Fried's fraud trial is about to start heating up — and the judge has a stark warning for the FTX founder.]() *\Image: Angela Weissa via Getty / Futurism\* ## Buckle Up Disgraced crypto scion Sam Bankman-Fried's fraud trial is about to start heating up — and the judge has a stark warning for the FTX founder. As the [*Reuters* reports](), US District Judge Lewis Kaplan told SBF ahead of his trial, which begins Monday, that he's facing major time. Given that the statutory maximum if convicted of all seven counts of fraud would be more than 100 years, the jurist was clearly not joking, though as *Reuters* points out, he's fairly [unlikely to actually get handed *quite* that long a sentence](). ## Like a Bird Kaplan, who [remanded Bankman-Fried to jail]() for alleged witness tampering after the 31-year-old leaked his ex-girlfriend and business partner [Caroline Ellison's diary entries]() [to the *New York Times*](), appeared to suggest that given the severity of his potential sentencing, the crypto pariah may be a flight risk. "Your client in the event of conviction could be looking at a very long sentence," the judge said. "If things begin to look bleak... maybe the time would come when he would seek to flee." SBF's lawyer Mark Cohen, who sought to get his client a temporary release during the trial so that his legal team could coordinate their strategy, rebutted that there was no reason to believe he would run away from justice considering that the onetime crypto king [presented himself for extradition]() from the Bahamas to the US back in December of last year. Kaplan appears to have met Bankman-Fried's legal team in the middle, allowing him to come to the courthouse hours before each day's proceedings begin. As of now, on the precipice of the trial that's set to start Monday, it's impossible to say which way the jury will go — but something tells us that the judge isn't going to be lenient. **More on SBF:** [*Sam Bankman-Fried's Mom Says the Government Is Being Super Mean to Her Beautiful Boy*]() ## Author At Futurism, I've often been drawn to unpacking the narratives that underlie technological, scientific and medical progress, with a special interest in areas of conflict and ambiguity that end up setting agendas and steering the fates of both elites and the hoi polloi. I'm a committed generalist, but I often find myself returning to work involving NASA and the private space sector, the effects of AI on media and society, and the mechanics of the pharmaceutical industry, with a specific focus on the spread of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. Prior to Futurism, I worked for publications ranging from Media Matters and Truthdig to Raw Story and Bustle. I'm also the author of "Myspace Scene Queens," a 2024 title in Instar Books' acclaimed "Remember the Internet" series. My work at Futurism has been cited by outlets including the New Yorker, Slate, Nieman Lab, the Verge, the MIT Technology Review, the Sunday Times, and the Daily Beast. I grew up in North Carolina, attended the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and now live in Brooklyn, New York. In my free time, I'm an avid reader and music fan; you can probably find me at a local poetry reading, concert, underground rave, or DJ set. I'm the proud parent of an ineffable orange cat named Mee-Mow. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()