Former FTX Director Ryan Salame Sentenced to 7.5 Years in Prison

The former CEO of FTXthe Bahamas subsidiary has been condemned Tuesday (May 28) at a longer prison sentence that the prosecutors had request.

Ryan Salame has been condemned to 7.5 years in prison by an American judge after prosecutors asked for a sentence of five to seven years And defense asked for 18 months or less, Bloomberg reported Tuesday.

With the conviction, Salame, who reached a plea deal with federal prosecutors in September, became the first of Co-founder of FTX Sam Bankman-Friedis a close associate of To be condemned for charges related to the collapse of the cryptocurrency exchange and its affiliates, according to the report.

Salame pleaded guilty to violating the campaign finance law and operating an unlicensed money transmittersays the report.

Bankman-Fried was sentenced in March for a 25-year term.

Three other executives affiliated with FTX and its companies – FTX co-founder Gary Wang, chief engineer Nishad Singh and Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison – pleaded guilty to criminal charges and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors during Bankman-Fried's trial in hopes of getting lighter sentences, according to the report.

They could To be condemned later this year, the report said.

Salamé did not agree to be a cooperating witnessalthough he informed Bahamian authorities of potential fraud at the company during its collapse and turned over 595,000 pages of documents to authorities, according to the report.

He joined sister company FTX Alameda Research In 2019 and then rose to become CEO of FTX Digital Markets at the time the companies filed for bankruptcyaccording to the report.

It was reported in August that Salame was the key point the man behind FTX political donation machine, who reportedly spent $24 million, and that he was known for his close ties to Bankman-Fried during his time at FTX.

During Salamé's trial, his lawyers tried to distance him from the scam which took place to FTX, saying he was deceived believing the companies were legitimate, according to the Bloomberg report.

Her the sentence could indicate the type of decisions the judge could make in the case of the other defendantssays the report.