FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) was sent to jail Friday after the judge overseeing his case revoked his bail. US District Judge Lewis Kaplan found probable cause that the disgraced former CEO repeatedly tampered with witnesses. In addition, Kaplan rejected Bankman-Fried’s attorneys’ request to delay his detention pending appeal.
Prosecutors argued that Bankman-Fried tried to harass a crucial witness last month when he showed a New York Times reporter the personal writings of his former partner Caroline Ellison, a cooperating witness who pleaded guilty in December to criminal charges related to defrauding FTX investors. The prosecution said SBF’s actions were an attempt to damage her reputation and influence prospective jurors. Meanwhile, SBF’s defense team accused prosecutors of using evidence laden with “innuendo, speculation, and scant facts.” Judge Kaplan sided with prosecutors, saying Bankman-Fried attempted to “tamper with witnesses at least twice.”
Reutersreports that the 31-year-old former FTX boss was ushered out of the court by US Marshals “after removing his shoelaces, jacket and tie and emptying his pockets.” The former CEO had been under house arrest in California (at his parents’ home in Palo Alto) since he was extradited in December following his arrest in the Bahamas last December. His $ 250 million bail package tightly controlled his internet usage.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/sam-bankman-fried-sent-to-jail-for-witness-tampering-202906192.html?src=rss
Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
When a highly anticipated set of Magic: The Gathering cards leaked on YouTube last week, it’s hard to imagine anyone would have guessed the incident would end with the involvement of one of the most infamous private security firms in the world. But that’s exactly what happened after YouTuber Oldschoolmtg uploaded an unboxing video featuring a collection of March of the Machine: The Aftermath booster packs.
If you’re not familiar, Aftermath is an upcoming 50-card Magic: The Gathering set Wizards of the Coast will release on May 12th. It’s billed as a supplement to the game’s current March of the Machine expansion, which has been available since April 21st. Predictably, Oldschoolmtg’s unboxing video was all anyone in the Magic: The Gathering community could talk about in recent days. Based on Wizards of the Coast’s reaction, it’s safe to say the video also irked the Hasbro-owned publisher.
Over the weekend, Oldchoolmtg uploaded another video, this time titled “The Aftermath of The Aftermath… Everything is Gone!” In the clip, the YouTuber says Pinkerton agents showed up at his home on Saturday morning and began demanding he hand over the “stolen” product. “I got up and recorded some videos,” Oldschoolmtg states. “Right after I got done with the video, dogs started barking because somebody is at the door. I come out and the wife’s answering the door and it was the Pinkertons.”
If you live in the US, the Pinkertons need no introduction. The company is one of the country’s oldest private security firms, with its original incarnation, the Pinkerton Detective Agency, dating back to 1850. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Pinkertons made a name for themselves with their anti-union operations, a job they continue to do in the 21st century.
Oldschoolmtg speculates the person he bought the unreleased cards from likely didn’t know they sent him an unreleased set. “Somebody screwed up and sent out the wrong cases to the gentlemen that I bought the boxes off of, because when he sold me the stuff he said he was selling me March of the Machine collector’s boxes — not Aftermath.”
After recovering the leaked Magic: The Gathering set, including the empty boxes and wrappers, the Pinkertons put Oldschoolmtg in touch with a Wizards of the Coast representative, who was “very apologetic about making my wife cry first thing in the morning by sending these heavy-duty lawmen.”
A Wizards of the Coast spokesperson confirmed to Polygon and Kotaku that the company sent the private security firm to Oldschoolmtg as “part of their investigation” into the leak. The YouTuber says the contact they spoke to at Wizards of the Coast offered to send them free products as compensation for what had happened. For what it’s worth, his YouTube viewership has also doubled since the original video went up.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/magic-the-gathering-publisher-wizards-of-the-coast-sent-the-pinkertons-after-a-leaker-200040402.html?src=rss
Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
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