Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced founder of cryptocurrency platform FTX, has been transferred out of a federal prison in New York City to be placed in a different detention center, roughly a year and a half into his 25-year sentence.
Bankman-Fried was moved out of the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn on Thursday and moved to a transit facility in Oklahoma City, according to the Bureau of Prisons.
The FTX founder had been held at the Brooklyn prison since August 2023, but his lawyers had requested he be moved to a federal prison in California in order to be closer to his parents, who live near Stanford University.
It is unclear where Bankman-Fried is headed after the transfer point in Oklahoma.
The Bureau of Prisons confirmed Bankman-Fried was at the transfer point but declined to say where he would be designated next “for privacy, safety, and security reasons.”
Bankman-Fried’s transfer process arrived weeks after he landed himself in solitary confinement after conducting an unapproved interview with conservative media personality Tucker Carlson. The decision is reportedly part of Bankman-Fried’s attempt to secure a pardon from President Donald Trump.
The 33-year-old was found guilty on seven counts of finance-related crimes in 2023 and sentenced to 25 years in prison and ordered to forefit $11 billion, exactly one year ago.
Once known as the “King of Crypto,” the young billionaire’s fame and fortune came tumbling down in November 2022 when a report revealed that most of FTX’s assets didn’t exist. The revelation sent investors and customers scrambling to withdraw their money, revealing an $8 billion hole in the company.
Prosecutors called the collapse one of the largest financial frauds in United States history.
Bankman-Fried is appealing his conviction, believing the judge who oversaw the case was biased and jurors were rushed to make a decision.
Judge Lewis Kaplan, who oversaw Bankman-Fried’s case, also oversaw Trump’s defamation trial against writing E. Jean Carroll – something the FTX founder has brought up in interviews to appeal to the president.
Bankman-Fried has also criticized the Biden administration’s regulatory approach to cryptocurrency and praised Republicans for embracing crypto.
