Judge Rules Identities Of Bankman-Fried's Bail Bond Backers Can Be Made Public

The judge handling the criminal case of Sam Bankman-Fried, the embattled founder and former CEO of the now-bankrupt crypto empire FTX, has ruled that the names of the two signers of his bail bond can be made public.

Based on a court filing Monday, United States District Judge Lewis Kaplan ruled that the identities of the persons who helped Bankman-Fried with his $250 million bail bond would be revealed next month.

"In my view, the individual bonds should be on the public record," Judge Kaplan said in Monday's court filing.

The judge offered several reasons for his recent decision.

One of these reasons noted that the identities of the sureties have no direct role in the release of Bankman-Fried since the bonds were not signed until after the bail and the sureties' names were unknown to the magistrate judge who approved the FTX founder's release.

According to Kaplan, public knowledge of the sureties' names will not affect future law enforcement or legal proceedings.

The judge further argued that releasing the sureties' names will not be deleterious to the privacy or the safety of the individuals and highlighted that bonds signed by sureties are, by tradition, publicized along with the names of the signatories.

Bankman-Fried was extradited to the U.S. from the Bahamas on Dec. 21, 2022, where he was briefly detained. He was released on bail on Dec. 22, with his parents signing a $250 million bail bond using their California house.

The bail process, however, involved two other smaller bonds of $500,000 and $200,000 that were co-signed by two individuals acting as sureties, including at least one individual who is not a Bankman-Fried family member.

In a letter to Judge Lewis Kaplan of the United States District Court in the Southern District of New York dated Jan. 3, Mark Cohen of the law firm Cohen & Gresser requested the court for the "names and other identifying information" of the two bail sureties not to be divulged to the public and redacted from bonds when they signed on Jan. 5, noting that if their information were to be made publicly available, they could be subject to the same harassment as SBF's parents.

"Consequently, there is serious cause for concern that the two additional sureties would face similar intrusions on their privacy as well as threats and harassment if their names appear unredacted on their bonds or their identities are otherwise publicly disclosed," Bankman-Fried's legal team revealed.

"If the two remaining sureties are publicly identified, they will likely be subjected to probing media scrutiny, and potentially targeted for harassment, despite having no substantive connection to the case. Consequently, the privacy and safety of the sureties are 'countervailing factors' that significantly outweigh the presumption of public access to the very limited information at issue," the six-page filing by Bankman-Fried's legal team read.

It is worth noting that while the judge already approved that the names of bail bond signatories be revealed, they will not be available until Feb. 7 or Feb. 14. However, Bankman-Fried's legal team can still appeal the decision and if successful, the identities of sureties will stay private.