In addition to tens of thousands of documents, prosecutors can rely on extensive quotes that SBF gave to the likes of The New York Times, Good Morning America and the BBC.
Prosecutors will be rubbing their hands with glee following Sam Bankman-Fried's lengthy post on Substack, according to legal experts.
According to Law360, a number of white collar lawyers have described SBF's in-depth article as "nightmarish" for his legal team — amid fears that it effectively amounts to "communicating their future defense aloud and locking them into it."
Others suggested that it's highly likely that Bankman-Fried's attorneys wouldn't have wanted him to go into such granular detail.
SBF's Substack came out of the blue last week — and in the post, he appeared to blame everyone but himself for FTX's collapse. Binance's CEO, the exchange's new management, and his legal advisers before the bankruptcy were all criticized.
The fallen entrepreneur went on to claim that he was "strong-armed" into filing for bankruptcy and could have saved FTX if he had been given a few more weeks — but this doesn't address burning questions about why billions of dollars is missing.
Sean Shecter, who works at a law firm in Florida, told the news outlet:
"Prosecutors love when a defendant provides so much information. If any of his comments are inconsistent with documents or testimony from other individuals, the government will pounce and say, 'See, this is further proof he is a liar who intended to defraud.'"
And this is part of the problem as SBF has previously tweeted things that simply turned out to be untrue.
Shortly before his crypto empire went under, in since-deleted tweets, the 30-year-old had sought to reassure customers by saying "FTX is fine" and had enough guns to cover all client holdings.
Insisting the company had "a long history of safeguarding client assets" — an assertion that's become questionable considering everything we know now — he added:
"FTX has enough to cover all client holdings. We don't invest client assets (even in treasuries.) We have been processing all withdrawals, and will continue to be."
All of this will be little comfort to an estimated nine million customers who have now been frozen out of their savings for three months — especially considering the bankruptcy proceedings could end up taking several years.
In addition to tens of thousands of documents, prosecutors can rely on extensive quotes that SBF gave to the likes of The New York Times, Good Morning America and the BBC. The legal experts speaking to Law360 went on to note that "nothing stops the government from using any of SBF's public statements against SBF during his cross-examination."
Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty to eight criminal counts in a Manhattan court earlier this month, and is now under house arrest at his parent's property in California on a $250 million bond.
Seemingly unable to resist commenting further on what went down at FTX, it's highly likely that we'll see further Substack posts and tweets from SBF before the trial begins in October.
