Plus, Jen Gomez, a former burglar who served ten years in prison, is now helping others secure their homes. Time to ditch the dating apps? Swiping right can be costly. Also, get the history of Nokia’s ringtone and tips on how to prevent your Amazon Echo from ruining the holidays.
The rise and fall of FTX and SBF: The ‘crypto king’ is facing 110 years in prison
I’m sure you’ve seen the headline — 110 years. That’s how much time fallen crypto king Sam Bankman-Fried could spend in prison. After a month-long trial, the FTX founder was just found guilty of seven counts, all revolving around $8 billion the crypto exchange stole from users.
Flashback to 2021, and SBF’s company was trading $20 billion in crypto daily, naming stadiums, buying mansions in the Bahamas and taking out Super Bowl commercials. What went wrong? Short answer: Everything.
Now, he’s in the same conversation as Bernie Madoff. This is so fascinating that I wanted to take you down the winding road of the biggest crypto mess we’ve seen yet.
“Kim, I don’t know anything about crypto”
That’s OK. The big question the jury had to decide on was simple — no knowledge of blockchain, wallets or keys required. Did SBF, now 31, intentionally trick customers and use all the money they invested as his own? The answer (which you know will be challenged in an appeal) is yes.
$26.5 billion
That’s how much SBF was worth when his crypto trading platform peaked. I bet even before the trial, you saw him — a guy with a big mop of curly hair who wore sneakers and a sloppy suit to testify before Congress.
The MIT graduate co-founded FTX (short for Futures Exchange) in 2019. By July 2021, it had an $18 billion valuation and investments from Softbank, Sequoia Capital and other big hitters. It only grew from there.
Remember the Super Bowl commercials with Larry David? That was FTX. (His parents are apparently huge fans.) The company was shelling out money in the Bahamas, too, where it set up its official headquarters.
SBF bought a $35 million penthouse he shared with nine people. All told, FTX spent $256.3 million to buy and maintain 35 different properties.
Spoiler: It didn’t end well
While FTX was raking in money, it was cozying up to trading firm Alameda Research. SBF had an on-again, off-again thing with the CEO, Caroline Ellison. Seriously, this thing is like a soap opera.
Singing like a canary: Sean “Diddy” Combs is facing life in prison for sex trafficking, racketeering and a slew of other charges. But it seems his biggest worry is not having a laptop in his cell to use whenever he wants. There’s a laptop he can use with supervision from 8:00 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. The judge says that’s enough time for him to do diddy-squat.
$300,000
How much an Alabama woman stole from the church where she worked. Most of the money went toward buying virtual gifts for TikTok creators. She faces up to 20 years in prison. What a mess.
15 years in prison
For a 21-year-old airman who leaked classified info. Jack Teixeira shared top-secret documents on a Discord server to show his online comrades what war was really like. Now he’ll know what war and prison are like.
$3,000 cellphones
White-collar criminals are shelling out to stay connected in prison. Some are smuggled in by guards and others via drone. A former securities broker who went to prison told Business Insider (paywall link) a box of 50 phones, camouflaged to look like grass, landed in the yard one day.
🚨 Grooming is a big problem: A Georgia man was sentenced to life in prison after he stalked and almost killed a 15-year-old girl. The two met on Snapchat, where he chatted with her until she invited him over. He showed up with duct tape, rope and a knife and sexually assaulted her before stabbing her 86 times. She survived but will likely suffer a lifetime of anguish. Please, I’m begging you to watch your kids.
$100 million
In narcotics trafficked on the dark web by a 23-year-old. Authorities finally bagged the Taiwanese kingpin, Rui-Siang Lin. Over four years, he sold up to $5 million in illegal drugs every month on his site, Incognito Market. For reference, the guy who created the Silk Road was 29 when the feds caught him. He’s serving two lifetimes in prison.
Good riddance: An evil 28-year-old woman from Delaware will hopefully spend a long time in prison for her role in a massive sextortion scheme. She and a group of accomplices pretended to be “young, attractive females” and lured young males (including many minors) into video chats. They then recorded the chats and threatened to leak the footage unless they were paid. Talk to your kids and any other guy in your circle.