Ryan Salame, a former top executive of FTX, the now-bankrupt cryptocurrency trading platform, is expected to plead guilty to criminal charges in a New York courtroom on Thursday afternoon, a person familiar with the matter has told CNN.
The plea comes less than one month before Sam Bankman-Fried, co-founder of the digital currency exchange, is set to go on trial. Prosecutors allege Bankman-Fried orchestrated one of the largest financial frauds in US history.
Salame, served as the chief executive of FTX and was a top lieutenant of Bankman-Fried, who is set to go to trial on October 2 facing numerous wire fraud and conspiracy charges. Bankman-Fried has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
A change of heart
Salame's expected guilty plea is a reversal. His attorney had previously told prosecutors he would invoke his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination if called as a witness against Bankman-Fried at next month's trial, according to a court filing last month.
A lawyer for Salame could not immediately be reached for comment.
Three other insiders have already pleaded guilty and are cooperating with authorities against Bankman-Fried since the company collapsed and filed for bankruptcy court protection last November: Caroline Ellison, the former head of Alameda, Bankman-Fried's hedge fund; Gary Wang, co-founder of FTX and Nishad Singh, a former engineer at FTX.
Prosecutors allege Bankman-Fried misused customer funds to make loans to Alameda, to fund venture investments and feed straw donors that were used to contribute to political campaigns, Republican and Democrat, to try to influence policy decisions impacting the crypto industry.
Prosecutors have said Salame played a role in the alleged scheme involving political donations. They want to show the jury a private message Salame sent to a family member in November 2021, explaining that he was a straw donor that Bankman-Fried used to make political donations.
