- Sam Bankman-Fried proposed Edward Stroz and Michael McGowan as technology consultants for his criminal fraud case.
- The consultants’ backgrounds include experience in digital forensics and high-profile cases.
- Bankman-Fried has until Friday to recommend a technical consultant or risk losing his bail package.
FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried has proposed two technology consultants, Edward Stroz and Michael McGowan, to assist the judge in his criminal fraud case to determine appropriate bail restrictions.
According to Bankman-Fried’s submission of their resumes, Stroz was a former FBI agent for more than 15 years and managed an international firm specializing in digital forensics and computer investigations.
Meanwhile, McGowan has been a digital forensics consultant for over 19 years and has led technical analysis on several high-profile cases, including authenticating Alex Rodriguez’s text messages in arbitration over his alleged use of performance-enhancing drugs and establishing that a man who sued Mark Zuckerberg for half his shares of Facebook had forged the contract on which the lawsuit was based.
The judge has given Bankman-Fried until Friday to recommend a technical consultant to advise on the appropriate restrictions, which must balance the defendant’s rights and needs with the integrity of the judicial process. Failure to comply may lead to the revocation of Bankman-Fried’s bail package and his imprisonment ahead of his October trial.
According to a filing with the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York on Feb. 24, Mark Cohen of Cohen & Gressler requested until March 3 to submit a proposal for additional bail conditions for Sam Bankman-Fried and identify a suitable technical expert for the case. This decision was made after the lawyers agreed to hire an expert in a hearing on Feb. 16, which discussed the former FTX CEO’s use of a virtual private network (VPN). Cohen shared,
The Government has no objection to this request. The parties also have no objection to continuing Mr. Bankman-Fried’s current bail conditions for whatever period the Court deems appropriate while these discussions are taking place.
According to the filing, the parties have been actively reviewing potential candidates to serve as the Court’s technical consultant, but have not yet found a suitable one. However, they have been having productive discussions about additional bail conditions for Sam Bankman-Fried, but require more time to finalize them.
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