On August 3, 2023, news broke that Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), the founder of the now-defunct cryptocurrency exchange FTX, is striving to evade imprisonment. He has refuted the charges of witness tampering brought against him by prosecutors, following an interview he conducted with the New York Times. The embattled crypto tycoon also contended that revoking his bond would infringe upon his freedom of speech.

SBF, the originator and ex-CEO of the unsuccessful crypto exchange FTX, insists he has never sought to threaten witnesses in his trial, which is slated to commence in October. He communicated this in a letter to U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan, as reported by Reuters and Bloomberg. He maintained that there was no basis for his incarceration as proposed by the prosecution.

The call for SBF's imprisonment came after the New York Times published excerpts from a diary belonging to Caroline Ellison, the former CEO of Bankman-Fried’s hedge fund Alameda Research and his ex-partner. Prosecutors accused him of attempting to intimidate Ellison, who has pleaded guilty and might testify against him.

Judge Kaplan has issued a temporary gag order and allowed both parties to prepare and submit written arguments before making a decision. SBF's attorney, Mark Cohen, argued that the interview was a legitimate exercise of his client's rights to comment on an ongoing article, for which alternate sources were already available. He further clarified:

SBF's interaction with the New York Times reporter was not an attempt to threaten Ms. Ellison or bias the jury.

FTX, which was one of the world's largest crypto exchanges before its downfall last year, filed for bankruptcy protection in the U.S. in November. Bankman-Fried was apprehended in December in Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas, and extradited to the United States to face charges of fraud, including the alleged misuse of customer funds, some of which were purportedly transferred to Alameda.

Bankman-Fried has pleaded not guilty and is currently under house arrest at his parents' home in California, secured by a $250 million bond. He has been actively communicating with the public and the media since his arrest, having made 100 calls with the New York Times reporter alone, as per U.S. authorities.

SBF's legal team argues that his imprisonment would infringe upon First Amendment rights. They stated, "As the government admits, criminal defendants have a right to speak to the press about their case to shape their public image and attempt to safeguard their reputation, as long as the communications are not designed to corrupt the course of justice." The defense also contended that limited internet access at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, where SBF would be detained, would hinder his trial preparations.