FTX Executive Ryan Salame Seeks to Withdraw Guilty Plea

Ryan Salaama former senior deputy at the failed cryptocurrency exchange FortisOn Wednesday, he asked a federal judge in New York to revoke his Confession campaign finance and money diversion crimes, saying prosecutors reneged on a key part of his plea agreement.

Salame’s lawyer Court filing In an effort to get him to plead guilty last September, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office allegedly told lawyers and Salaam in April 2023 that they would stop investigating his live-in partner, Michelle Bond, for campaign finance violations if he pleaded guilty.

The document states: “In light of Salaam’s apparent desire to protect Bond” — she is the mother of Bond’s eight-month-old child — “Salaam agreed to enter into a plea agreement.”

“Yet the government failed to keep its word and recently resumed its investigation of Bond and indicted her,” the defense attorneys wrote.

The lawyers asked U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan to order Salaam’s guilty plea to be thrown out “for breach of contract by the government” or to order prosecutors to abide by their promise not to bring criminal charges against Bond.

Nicholas Biase, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, declined to comment on Salaam’s filing.

Salam will begin serving his sentence of seven and a half years on October 13. Order to pay Forfeiture of more than $6 million and restitution of more than $5 million.

In a social media post about the application, Salam wrote: “This is all true, but I just filed a court document and I’m very nervous about this because I know it means the most powerful institution in the world is going to target me and my loved ones again, but I hope this encourages more people to speak the truth honestly and call out un-American behavior.”

Salaam is not a cooperating witness in the FTX criminal investigation, but he testified last fall in the criminal trial of former FTX boss Sam Bankman-Fried, who was convicted of massive fraud and conspiracy and sentenced in March to 25 years in prison.

The charges against Salaam stem from his involvement in a multi-million dollar campaign finance scheme while at FTX.

Bankman-Fried was also allegedly deeply involved in campaign finance schemes.

But prosecutors chose not to bring similar charges against Bankman-Fried because he had Convicted The jury was tried on seven counts of securities fraud and money laundering.

Three other cooperating witnesses who testified against Bankman-Fried at trial and pleaded guilty are awaiting sentencing.

Among them is Caroline Ellison, the former CEO of Alameda Research, who once dated Bankman-Fried.

Also convicted were FTX’s former director of engineering, Nishad Singh, and FTX co-founder and chief technology officer, Gary Wang.

Singh and Wang will be sentenced on October 30 and November 20, respectively.

Ellison’s sentence has not yet been determined.