Bankman-Fried prosecutors may show jury evidence of political donations, judge rules

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Prosecutors may show the jury at Sam Bankman-Fried's trial starting next week evidence of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange founder's political contributions, a judge ruled on Tuesday.

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan had initially charged Bankman-Fried, 31, with conspiring to break U.S. campaign finance laws. But they later dropped that charge after the Bahamas, where Bankman-Fried was arrested in December, said they never intended to extradite him on it.

But in a written order on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan said evidence of the former billionaire's political donations were "intertwined inextricably" with charges he defrauded FTX customers by stealing billions of dollars in their deposits.

"Evidence that the defendant spent FTX customer funds on political contributions is direct evidence of the wire fraud scheme because it is relevant to establishing the defendant's motive and allegedly fraudulent intent," Kaplan wrote.

Bankman-Fried has pleaded not guilty. His trial is set to start on Oct. 3.

(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; Editing by Daniel Wallis)